Hi mnt_dreams and welcome to our community here on the DB board. You will meet your neighbors as they come to your "thread" (your story here) and make responses to your posts. If you look down close to the bottom on the list of forums, you will see abbreviations that are used. Not all, but some common ones. It helps. Anyway, if you will reach out to others and respond to their posts, it will help you build up a support system quicker here on the board. When you want to "vent" your frustrations, it is best to tell us in advance that you are just blowing off some steam. Same thing when you are seeking advice....just say you need it.
There are all types of personalities here in the community but most of the "regulars" are very nice people and if you will stick with us, I think you will grow as a person and you will survive your stitch whichever or however it may turn out.
After saying all of that, let me give my two cents worth on what I am thinking about your stitch (situation). Your H was probably very tied down to his responsibilities when he was a boy at home. I am sure he must have felt "trapped" in that. Then he married a woman who already had a family so that meant more responsibility......which is not to be a cop-out for wanting to "escape" his life with you and the kids, but he feels a "crisis" and unfortunately he has found another woman to talk to after you rejected his idea and desire to move where the snow and mountains are. He probably took it as you rejecting "him". Men are wired very different than the way we are and it is sure hard to understand them, but we make our mistake by thinking they should think like we do. They don't!
Reading the DR book is the best thing right now. Follow it to the letter. You are doing the right thing by backing off and giving him plenty of space and time to get his head together. However, I want to warn you that the worse is probably yet to come. You need to be prepared to discover that he is more involved with this OW than you even think at this time. I hope I am wrong, but it just seems to follow in most cases. He may even decide to move without you and the kids or he may leave you for this OW. So.....you need to think real hard and decide what it is you want, what you are willing to do and how long you are willing to wait. You need to know what the "deal breaker" will be for you in this R. You need to have boundaries set. Most of all, while he is away from you and the kids, you need to do a severe evaluation of yourself. Take a personal inventory and give yourself a grade of how your appearance is when you are out in public and when are at the house all day.... and when you are alone with your H. How is your personality? Have you gotten slack about some habits. Maybe formed some bad habits that you know he doesn't like, but you've kept doing them? Just get down to the nitty-gritty of everything from the tone of your voice to your laughter. Are you too loud at parties? Do you use bad language or anything that would appear unlady-like? Everything you can think of....try to see it through his eyes.
Now, while he is gone and maybe even spending time with the OW, your project will be do to an over-haul on yourself. Get a different hair-do. Maybe a different color to help make you look younger. Update your make-up and your ward robe. Get an exercise program going b/c it will give you energy, lift depression, lose weight and just be an over-all good plan. It even gives a person a sense of self-confidence! If you have self-esteem issues, then get some self-help books and read them. Make this time you have away from him as a time to work on yourself, so when he does see you again......you will knock his socks off by your improved appearance and personality and attitude. Attitude......oh, that gets us women in a lot of trouble sometimes, doesn't it? Maybe you need to work on that also and even "practice" having a positive and uplifting, and happy attitude so when he comes home (hopefully), he will discover that you are once again, a fun person to be around. You need to become a person that he had rather be with over anyone else in the world.
The main thing to know is that all of this will be for YOU. It is not a gimmick to get your H back home again! The changes you make need to be for you and for the rest of your life. You have a lot of years ahead of you to enjoy and you want to be the best "you" that is possible. Hopefully, it is not too late and he will see those changes and respond to them. However, don't be surprised if he doesn't......right away, anyway. All you have to do is read the stories right here on this board and you will find how they all begin to sound alike. But, if you are willing to pour yourself into this project of working on you, and coming here to post as often as you possibly can, and realize that this may take a long time for your H to get his head cleared and decide what it is he truly wants. You must also realize that if he decides he no longer wants to stay in a M with you.......all these things you have done will certainly not be in vain b/c you will be stronger and better to move forward in your life and you will learn a lot if you will stay focused on what you are doing.....and not what he is or isn't doing. You don't make any references to your changes to him. You don't talk about the future or ask him questions about it. You don't push him, chase him, or pursue him in any way whatsoever. Just leave him alone and "wait".
You dashed his dreams and now he is trying to deal with that and I'm afraid he will not handle things the way he should but I hope I am wrong and he will get his head together and come back home. But even if he does, he may be very unhappy b/c of you calling the shots about what he could or could not do.
Do you work outside the home or are you a SAHM?
It may seem like a long time to him before the kids go to college and it is just the two of you. He may be thinking that he won't be able to do then what he wants to be doing now. Maybe this is a stuped question, but what difference does it make where you live until the kids go to college? I moved around my entire life and never knew what it was to stay in the same house over two or three years at a time. It does not stunt a kid's growth. Anyway, it just seems to me that with you spending too much time away from him and at ballgames, etc. and then using the kids and college as an excuse not to move where he wanted.......you really hurt him and dashed his dreams and that is a bad thing where a man is concerned.......according to I've been told and read.
You said there had never been a problem with the age difference, and that is good, however, depending "how" you shot down his idea of wanting to move......I would think that it would be easy for him to feel like he was just one of the kids. Sorry to be so blunt, but maybe it is b/c I have been reading books on how some women treat their H's more like they were the H's mother rather than his wife. So, I hope he did not feel like you were talking to him as if you were his mother. I knew a couple where the W was ten years older than the H and at first everything was fine, but as the years passed by, she began dishing out orders to him and calling all the shots just like she did with her kids. Not good! I just threw that punch in free of charge...
So, now you know I put in more than two-cents worth (lol). But hope to hear from you often and that you will be tough and take whatever anyone has to say to you, okay?
Take care, Sandi2
It is not about what you feel should work in your M. It is about doing the work that gets the right results. Do what works!
