Maybe I should be in piecing part 7?

[Hope4us]

Mel, I never thought it was going to be easy for her. Not in a million years. But that 8 weeks was not easy on me either. I worked 36 straight 12 hour days. Some were 14 hour days.

Am I saying what I did was any harder than W? Not at all. We BOTH knew it would be hard. And it was a decision we made together. In fact, after we'd discussed it a number of times, my last statement to her before accepting the assignment was "If you don't want me to go, just say don't go". And she said she was ok with me going. Her flying up would have been kind of boring for her because I was on the night shift and would sleep all day.

But I think you're absolutely correct. I KNOW we disconnected in those 2 years I traveled so much. I know I wasn't around to help her like I had the previous 20 years of our marriage. I get it.

There are many infidelity authors that suggest limiting the time apart. Dr. Harley suggests that a couple should NEVER spend even a single night apart. Now, in my case, that's impossible and I'm with WDID that some nights apart can aid a marriage, but how much I was gone certainly did not help.

One thing I read in Venus and Mars (I think it was) was that when a H and W are separated by work or whatever, that when they come back together that the man is ready to just jump right back to normal, but women need to acclimate to it. Many times a man will want to ditch the kids so just he and his wife can go out alone where a women wants the man to "nest" with the family to reconnect.

Just another one of those differences between men and women that get us all into trouble because we don't understand how the other thinks.