Thank you for your input. I'll try to make the phrase, "Make it easy for him to tell me things." my new motto!
Do you have an opinion on whether I should address my EA and apologize for hurting him? Or whether I should wait and let him tell me what he's angry about?
I told my husband the reason I was quitting my job was because I found myself making excuses to be around my friend more and was afraid I was going to cross the line.
I went to a celebration of my friend and his wife's new baby, and before I went asked my husband if he wanted me to not go. And I asked if he was jealous.
He said he was jealous, but said he trusted me to go.
He also said that he didn't know if he would have the strength to quit his job if he were in a similar situation.
So, I still don't know if that's why he has times when he thinks of something I've done and he gets mad at me.
It's freaky how I had forgotten all this stuff and now it's coming back to me.
Would a better approach be for me to tell him that I'd like the chance to apologize for things that have hurt him. And to ask him to tell me when he thinks of something and gets mad?
I'm not sure if I should approach this issue or wait for him to bring it up.
Would it even be helpful? I know I'm trying my best to focus on the present, perhaps I should allow him to do the same?
Just real quick here, because I need to quit procrastinating on my day job ...
I think that you and Jethro are right on target with your new "Make it easy for him to tell me things" motto. That could help your situation out quite a bit. You can even ask him what you could do, or quit doing, that would help you along this path. A practice in communicating.
Also, be cautious about automatically "assuming" that he's lying. Give him the benefit of the doubt, even for just a few minutes, do a 180 on your thoughts, and look at how you might approach things differently if you were to assume he was actually telling the truth.
If he IS lying about things, rest assured that the truth will soon be revealed.
As for digging deep into the past, and talking about any past indiscretions, I would suggest that you really look hard at what your motivation is surrounding this. Do you want to do this for him, or for yourself? Would it be to help bring you closer, to help relieve any "guilt" you might have, to help ease his pain, etc.? Would doing this run the risk of stopping the forward momentum you're building up? Or even set you back from where your relationship is now? Do you think that you are at the stage of piecing where doing this would help your cause?
To be honest with you, HE might not be thinking about this as much as YOU are.
While you're giving this some thought, maybe you can start "rehearsing" what you want to say, and journal it all on paper. Keep writing and re-writing until you think that you're saying just exactly what you want to say. When you're done with this, you might have a better idea of your intentions, you will know that your words will say just what you want them to, or, you may find out that your urge to even go to that place will pass.
Key DB'ing basics here for yourself of "What you focus on expands", and "Actions speak louder than words".
Hope this helps!
P.S. Did I help answer your question for you at all?
Last edited by Jamesjohn; 07/31/0304:42 PM.
JJ
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Wow, you said a mouthful! Thank you so much for taking the time to help me!
His confessing the recent lie triggered me in a big way, but you are right, I need to focus on the fact that he told the truth instead of wondering what else he might have lied about.
As far as the rest, I started my postings early this morning pondering how I should address the issues I was facing...lingering bad feelings and fear that he might have had a PA, and his lying...and in doing so remembering that I'd had an EA! Previously I had been proud of myself that I had stopped myself from having a PA. But after reading on the bb, I realized I had HAD an EA. And I was able to see how my actions might have precipitated his actions. And so I felt guilty for the Pain he MIGHT be feeling from that.
Quoting JJ: As for digging deep into the past, and talking about any past indiscretions, I would suggest that you really look hard at what your motivation is surrounding this. Do you want to do this for him, or for yourself? Would it be to help bring you closer, to help relieve any "guilt" you might have, to help ease his pain, etc.? Would doing this run the risk of stopping the forward momentum you're building up? Or even set you back from where your relationship is now? Do you think that you are at the stage of piecing where doing this would help your cause?
The bottom line is I was concerned about these periods of anger against me that he told me about.
I don't know what is causing them and I'm concerned that they might be holding back our progress.
If he's not angry about my EA, bringing it up would be hurtful and pointless.
So, yes, you answered my question. I think I need to take the time to think about how I want to handle this. Perhaps my best bet is to let him bring up anything he's angry about. And when he does, do my best to validate and apologize.
Welcome back to "Piecing" PnT ... and there seems to be a good feeling it will be for good this time! Sorry it took a while to drop in and I haven't quite caught up yet on up to posting made by noon today, but have to go soon so I wanted to make a couple of quick comments. Oh, I honored that you referred to me a being a help during "one" of those moments!
You know, I've seen mention of it several times thru out your threads, but it didn't strike me until now ... the references to my / your towns. H moving from his town to get a job in your town. I can't help but feel he is intimidate by this to some degree. Is the store he works at a chain where they might have a store in the neighboring town ... north, south east or west of your town. Would it be possible that you both can move there and make it "our" town? Just a thought.
Also about addressing EA, I think it is something that will need to be done when the time is appropriate and the that time is when he is comfortable having the discussion of each person being 100% responsible for their 50% of the R. I don't quite think he is there yet, but if he's reading DR, then its just a matter of time before he lets you know he is ready to handle having that discussion.
I'll save my questions about whether he's mad about my EA or not, until he brings up the conversation in which we talk about what went wrong.
As far as a compromise, I did suggest during my 'damage control' that we could commute, that way he could keep his job and make the huge leap a faith a much smaller leap. He thanked me for the suggestion, but he wasn't happy about commuting. He did suggest me commuting, but then he said, "You wouldn't like that either, since if I keep my job, I'll always be working late and on weekends and we'd get very little time together."
So, I think I scored points with the suggestion, but he did talk about moving to my town during that wonderful phone conversation we had 3 days ago.
In any case, depsite all my freaking out yesterday, ya'll would be proud that I haven't contacted him in anyway since our phone conversation.
Today will be the 3rd day since we last talked, so I might have a difficult time, as the 3rd day seems to be when I feel the urge to call.
In any case, I think it's important that I wait for him to contact me, because our last conversation was soooo intense.
And I'm hoping that he's still reading DR...and I don't want to interrupt that!
How do you feel about love being a choice, a decision, and not a feeling?
In what ways have you, and your partner, might have let your love dwindle, and not made your love for each other a priority?
How do you feel about Michele's staement of "If your spouse reports falling out of love, just say nothing and remind yourself that nothing is permanent. If s/he fell out of love, s/he can fall into love again"?
What do you think about NOT talking to him/her about your "feelings" of love for each other? About not putting any pressure on them to talk about it?
What do you think are some of the differences between "being in love" with a person, and "loving" a person?
I have to agree with this. The funny thing is that my husband has always been a Vulcan. Never let his emotions rule him. Always went with logic. I on the other hand had always been the emotional one in our relationship.
So, it's strange to me to try to explain to him that he needs to go with his mind on this one, not his heart.
Talk about role reversal.
When we first seperated and then began talking again, I made sure to not tell him I love you, at the end of our conversation, as was my habit.
When he finally said that he loved me, after several months of me DBing, I gasped and whispered, "Say it again." and he did.
Now, I notice that the times when he doesn't say it, he's having doubts that he's trying to deal with.
If he doesn't say it and I do, then he'll respond, but it's so much nicer when he says it first and means it.
I think loving a person is what we all are striving to do on this bb...unconditional love. Being in love, in my mind, is the euphoric feeling we get when things are going wonderfully!
...
Sorry it took a while to drop in and I haven't quite caught up yet on up to posting made by noon today, but have to go soon so I wanted to make a couple of quick comments. Oh, I honored that you referred to me a being a help during "one" of those moments!