Those are great examples of what I like to call "truth darts."
Well done. Just don't try and deliver more than about 2-3 of them a week. Well-timed and well-landed. More than that, and you're "teaching" them, and you can't teach the wayward mind.
Good point Puppy and I'll have to keep that in mind. Yeah, I don't want to teach her...I was just dumbfounded by that response and just honestly had to make that reply. I mean seriously...what the heck was she thinking with that one? But yeah, I do like the truth darts. Anyway, she is working tonight so she won't be coming home but I have a sneaking suspicion I'll get a late night call again. If I do I don't know if I'm going to answer it or not...still undecided on that one.
Just some thoughts here. I feel really lucky and blessed to have the IC I have. He started out as our couples counselor and that is primarily what he does and he wants couples to stay together but he doesn't want it to happen at the expense of the individuals involved. He is the one who introduced me to DR and to this site and they have saved me from myself. Something he said early on in this I now truly get and believe. He said that going through this process while you may want to save your marriage you need to ensure you save yourself. Sometimes they coincide and you can do both but sometimes you have to choose and you should always choose to save yourself. Why save a marriage only to be miserable or lose yourself in it? These words are so true and is what I am living by now. I can save myself. I can be the best man I can be for D3 and me. Maybe the marriage can be saved and maybe not but I truly can be and I will be. I hope anyone who reads this takes that to heart because I do believe it's the way we should approach this.
Other than this board, the books, and the DB coach, I hadn't been speaking with a family/IC counselor. I finally printed out the local list of family counselors and even tried to get a name out of the DB folks for a DB-centric counselor (no luck).
Given your IC experience, DC, I'm going to call on Thursday to start interviewing local family counselors to start my IC. If W ever comes around, good for her, but me first.
Just some thoughts here. I feel really lucky and blessed to have the IC I have. He started out as our couples counselor and that is primarily what he does and he wants couples to stay together but he doesn't want it to happen at the expense of the individuals involved. He is the one who introduced me to DR and to this site and they have saved me from myself. Something he said early on in this I now truly get and believe. He said that going through this process while you may want to save your marriage you need to ensure you save yourself. Sometimes they coincide and you can do both but sometimes you have to choose and you should always choose to save yourself. Why save a marriage only to be miserable or lose yourself in it? These words are so true and is what I am living by now. I can save myself. I can be the best man I can be for D3 and me. Maybe the marriage can be saved and maybe not but I truly can be and I will be. I hope anyone who reads this takes that to heart because I do believe it's the way we should approach this.
So I was right...W called around midnight last night. I didn't pick up. I'm sure it was to talk about what I had told her and didn't feel the need to rehash it when I was tired and wanted to sleep. I'm sure Puppy is right and she's going to start pressing me on it...testing me to see if I break.
If she asks you what you're going to do, answer as I suggested above. If she presses you, and asks you why you won't tell her more, just say "Because I don't want to right now."
There's nothing that can be said to "I don't want to ..."
What you want to convey is that YOU are beginning to formulate some decisions, apart from her, and that you feel no need to convey right now what those are.
That shouldn't be hard to do Puppy because that's honestly how I feel. I still have things to figure out and don't know what will happen once the paperwork is done, which I have told her this more than once. And honestly, I don't want to talk about it more. She knows my feelings...knows my boundaries...why should I have to continually restate them you know. And I am nice and cordial whenever I talk to her or are around her. If I feel like I'm getting emotional or pissed when I'm with her or talking to her then I just excuse myself from the conversation and go do something else for awhile. No use talking when I'm in that state as nothing productive is going to come out of it.
