My D17's BF has no relationship with his father. His other brother is dads favorite but BF is ignored. On the other had, BF's mother is very protective of her son.
As I understand it, BF's dad is in his mid 50's and still smokes pot from time to time. His mom and his dad have a strained relationship as his dad is also controlling of her.
So, lately I've been helping BF with various things. His computer experiments, and I taught him how to solder to put together some electronic kits I had laying around.
D17 says he's really excited about all the new things he's learning. She told her mom about this stuff.I like the boy and I can't see how a father wouldn't be proud of him. He's a good kid and very smart.
So, a little while ago I called W to give her an update on D13's health. While we were talking I mentioned D17 and her problems with BF's mom. W went on to talk about how they have a messed up marriage so she's unhappy and takes it out on D17.
I'm thinking that W should look at their marriage and realize that it's way worse that anything we ever did. He's an unhappy, mean man.
Anyway, she goes on to say how 'wonderful' it is that BF has such a good connection with me. That it's good for him and for me. She is genuinely happy about it.
Then she jokes "Don't get too attached though, you know what happens when D17 decides to let them go" and laughs. See, we've gotten to 'like' old BF's but when D17 finally realizes they are not as compatible as she likes and breaks up with them we lose too.
Kind of like a divorce.
It was an interesting discussion. It's strange that we can have these discussions when she 'has to be divorced'.
I have had this kind of conversation with my W in the past. They don't seem to be able to draw a connection with what they are saying and the situation they have created. for example, the other day W called me to tell me how D5 is acting out of emotion rather than logic. I had to keep from laughing and telling her that she is doing the very same thing.
The more of this odd behaviour I see in my W I truely believe that this has more to do with mental issues than with a character flaw.
M35 W37 S9 D6 M12 yrs Know 15 yrs Bomb 1/28/07 My Sitch Failure is the opportunity to start again more intelligently - Henry Ford
On another note: W was over earlier and saw the grass was a little brown. I told her the sprinkler system was broken and I'd fix it next weekend. She offered to come over a few time this week to water the grass by hand.
I told her I have two lovely daughters who can also do that.
Why she makes these offers is beyond me. I guess she still thinks of it as 'her house'.
Amy, if you are doing good with your sitch, I want to read about it. Could you point me to your thread? And if I go there, I'd want to read the details of whats working. I know my sitch is a lost cause, but who knows. Maybe I'll find hope in yours.
I really wish I could find the goodness and inspiration I once found from everyone here. I've seemed to have lost it somehow. Where are all the positives? Is it that time of year?
Poet ~ I do not maintain a thread here any longer. I stopped a few months ago when I thought I was going to throw in the towel on my sitch and I started to date someone. That did not go well at all because while all the warm fuzzy stuff was nice at first, I am in no way really desiring a relationship with any man other than my husband. Once I untangled myself from that situation, I spent a few weeks really thinking over my sitch, all the ups and downs, positive steps and backward slides and I remembered my husband (who has known about this board for a long time) once told me that because of my being here, sometimes he had a hard time knowing what was really me (caused by real changes) and what was just a strategy that I'd picked up from the board. I don't know why I remembered that but I did and I decided to no longer keep a thread with details of every little encounter my husband and I shared.
That said, I have settled into a place of peace for the first time in over a year and I'm back in this completely and for the long haul. I know the pitfalls. The lonliness, the doubt, the obstacles, the foolish pride and the outside deceptions that will come to lure a stander from his or her post. I have been a slave to guilt over my MLC. I have been a fearful enabler. I have been a pissed off quitter determined to find out what was 'out there' only to discover that no matter what is 'out there', it is not out there for me. My family remains separated - split right down the middle - and I'm not leaving it like this when I have the knowledge, the heart and the conviction to turn it around. My race is no picnic. It comes with some very formidable opponents; depression and functional (for now) alcoholism.
Poet, "what works" is simply not definable. This is a journey of getting to know yourself on a most fundamental level and then creating your own definitions and writing your own story with them. I don't know your sitch well enough to comment to you personally but I can tell you this: Determining to continue to grow as a person while you DB and still refusing to leave someone else behind (in my case) is a very hard line to straddle and it really comes down to a battle between the heart and the ego. In my case my heart won out but my ego did not go down without one hell of a fight.
My husband and I are very close now. I'm the one he talks to about everything again and even when he doesn't use words it's okay because I already know. I just know the man and I love him. Where he is right now is not where he wants to be and there truly, truly is not another person that's going to help him and believe in him and help him fight the battles that are ahead of him. His parents and a handful of friends are all that are in his life. He isn't close enough to any of them to share the things he shares with me. That said, I don't see my husband as a burden. I don't feel obligated to stick around and 'be there'. I want to be there. This is who I am. I am his wife and I love him deeply.
Time, patience, insight (first into yourself and then your spouse), the humility and courage to allow yourself to be the first to change and a million steaming mugs of 'shut the hell up' is what all this requires. And reaching a place of calmness and peace inside yourself so you can actually do it. And in the midst of all this personal drama, you have to get a life of your own. One of the things I am doing is taking a course for what our town calls the "Community Emergency Response Team". I'm just getting myself out there, meeting people and trying to position myself to be able to help others because so much help has always been provided to me at so many different points in my life. I may never have enough money to give any of it away but I figure I can learn some new skills and then I can give my time. It's a start...
At this stage - 3 years post MLC - it isn't just me doing things and being there for my husband. He does things for me as well. It took a LONG, LONG time for us to get to this point but I don't want to give the impression that this is all give on the part of the stander. It is not. However if you are the stander, you'd best be prepared to give more than you get for a while. Maybe even a long while. Only you can know if your efforts are fruitless. Sometimes it takes a long time to see the positive results of your labor.
Poet, I am sorry that I can not provide you with a story of reconciliation to inspire you. Largely, a stander must just search marital resources and their own heart and soul. A lot of the work to restore a marriage is actually done within yourself before it starts expanding outward, eventually touching your spouse. And if you think you've done that work and you're feeling impatient, you probably need to stand down for a while and think again. At least that's been my experience.
Good luck and God bless.
Frank - I read this morning that you asked me to repost a timeline of my period of "awakening" from MLC. I will do that as soon as I can. My apologies for the above hijack.
what I would like to see are times when you continued to firm up the boundaries you did when you made her leave
it seems to me that letting her come over and do whatever is being wishywashy on that boundary
does that make sense
like you said no messing around or you are out, except when you call and are polite and then you can come over
you deserve to see yourself as worth more than that
she is who she is
who I am concerned with is you
and
i am not bitter about my divorce or the person LSS is and, in his case, always was
it is what it is and without it i never would have met the amazing person I am with I never would have felt I was worth as much as I am getting
and
I too was abused as a child but it did not make me into a person who flakes out on their life do not make her a victim of her circumstnaces we all have choices we make them and then we have to deal with the consequences
our lives are full of choices good and bad
don't make excuses for her bad behavior it takes her power away
Frank - I read this morning that you asked me to repost a timeline of my period of "awakening" from MLC. I will do that as soon as I can. My apologies for the above hijack.
AmyC
Amy, this is not a hijack. This is stuff I need to hear. Please keep posting on my thread. In many ways I was like your husband 3 years ago. My W keeps going back to running away or MLC. I wish she was remotely like you and actually WANTED to save her marriage. In some ways I think she does, she just doesn't know how and runs away.
what I would like to see are times when you continued to firm up the boundaries you did when you made her leave
it seems to me that letting her come over and do whatever is being wishywashy on that boundary
does that make sense
like you said no messing around or you are out, except when you call and are polite and then you can come over
you deserve to see yourself as worth more than that
she is who she is
who I am concerned with is you ... I too was abused as a child but it did not make me into a person who flakes out on their life do not make her a victim of her circumstnaces we all have choices we make them and then we have to deal with the consequences
our lives are full of choices good and bad
don't make excuses for her bad behavior it takes her power away
Fig, you have no idea how much I value this post from you.
I was also a victim of abuse as a child, I don't let it stop me from achieving. I lived with an abusive grandmother who made me live in a life where the 'rules' changed daily so I could never ever do anything 'right'.
When I 'crashed' yeas ago I put my W in the position of 'grandmother'. Instead of giving me unconditional love while I was floundering she avoided me, then ultimately ran away for the first of what would end up to be 3 times.
at this point of my life I realize that I need to take care of 'me' before I can do anything with any woman. I need to get my 'mojo' back.
So yes, I understand from you and Amy that my boundaries are important.
He told her that she needed to grow up and have a life before she was going to be able to share one with him, and that reconciliation wasn't an option until she had grown enough to feel good about herself and be able to enjoy his company instead of being dependent on it.
I think this is exactly the Rx for my situation, too. My own wife was wise enough to see it on her own, though she did not express it this way.
So I am waiting and praying for those changes. For my part I am getting busy with my own life.
M 43 S14 S13 D11 D7 Divorce final: Jan 2009 Making it up as I go....
First of all, I'm glad you are making connections to people in your church. There's a lot of love and support there.
Keep in mind that any half-decent, orthodox, pastor is going to take a quasi-DB approach regarding calling it quits on the marriage, especially when they are fresh to the situation. It's alot like calling a DB coach for the first time. You will get the textbook approach as if the bomb were just dropped a few weeks ago. I think, perhaps you need to find a pastor ther you can relate to and tell him the WHOLE story and let him digest it. In the beginning, they will encourage you to drop your "guard" and loosen the boundaries to create bridges to your wife, possibly returning to the enabling behavior. After they've listened long enough and walked with you long enough they will probably recommend the tough love approach you are taking now. Most of my grounded friends/pastors who have walked with me this long are advocating a tough love, take no crap approach. One pastor has suggested an ultimatum followed with my filing for divorce. (Which, by the way is in Michelle's book, DR)
I can't even begin to guess the right approach regarding your wife's desire to re-connect with household activities. You are compassionate and loving. Yet, in some sense, she can't be shielded from consequences.
My guess is that a major change needs to happen with your wife before she really wants to truly return to the marriage. A change of AmyC proportions. I think if you hang tough, and lovingly make her feel the consequences of her actions, if she REALLY wants to return, she'll make the necessary changes.
Do you want her to need you or want you? I think consequences are a wake up call and it makes us realize our need of the other person, and the loss we are about the incur. But the real changes tend to happen after the panicked/needy attempts to reconnect.
Our WAS wants to see real changes in us, not merely techniques and strategies. In come cases, we won't/can't change a lot, and we need to probably tell out spouses to accept us as we are or take a hike. I think far too few us really are able to GAL and become the better option. But that's another discussion, isn't it?
I think you don't want a needy, flightly, ungrounded, uncommited, unfaithful, wife, even if she makes "attempts" to ingratiate herself to you. Now you are in the position of looking for REAL change.
