Desperate for direction

[Puppy Dog Tails]

Is it "controlling" if an alcoholic asks you for your help in keeping the alcohol out of the house?

Is it "controlling" if a pyromaniac asks for your help in keeping the matches away from them?

Exactly.

[JKL2009]

If she is asking for this, don't think of it as controlling. Seems to me a good step on her part.

[Kenn]

Congrats! Glad to see things turn around!

I saw in one post you said that she wanted to give you her passwords but you felt it might be controling.

Then in another post you used the term exchange.

I think (and I could be way off base) that you are on to something here. If you want to keep a marriage of equals which in my humble oppinion each mariage should be AND have a transparency then an exchange of transparency may be the answer. That way she gets the help she is asking for but also doens't feel like the weaker link in the partnership.

Glad things are working out for you!

[Doingitright]

Thanks...Yes an exchange is a good way to put it. It helps both of us build trust. W donated the extra phone she had to a womens shelter and has since stopped using her other email account. It seems that she is truly trying this time. Like she really wants it to work. Yet every time I post something positive here we fall backwards almost immediately. So here's to breaking the streak.

Today is MC with topic of trust. W has also made a point of spending more time with the K's. And doing house projects together with me.

[Doingitright]

Broke the streak. Now working on new ground to cover. Still have doubts about the W being honest. Hope to push through those over the next weeks. We have made some break through in MC. They were pretty profound from my wife's point of view and mine. Can't say enough about promarriage MC.

The GAL process does turn things around. Especially when everyone around you notices. It is so important. Everyone have a great weekend.

[Doingitright]

New question...Here is the back ground...
W keeps saying she knew it would never happen with the OM. That it was safe for her to have the fantasy as he would never act on anything; too far away, married happily blah, blah, blah. That seems to be W's face saving approach. This just sticks like a knife in my heart as I know it is just what she has to tell me and herself to lessen the severity of what she was doing. And after being caught time and time again.

W has now focused on her problem with OM as being no worse than my hiring someone and using software to find things out. It was all done when the D was coming (not an excuse just a fact). I told her about it almost 2 months ago. Recently W stated what I did was against the law etc etc.

Well W recently found old emails on this subject and excerpts of her emails with OM. This was done by W hacking my account. They were the last remaining items of the nightmare. They were deleted in the last few days along with all other remnants of the dark time. Over the weekend W announced she looked at the details some time last week. It couldn't have been but a day or 2 before I deleted everything. I had no idea she had done it when i deleted everything.

I think "ironic" fits as the label here. Now she wants to know who I hired so things (our healing as a couple) can move forward. I of course don't have the details as it is all gone. So she doesn't believe me.

Question......
Has anyone experienced this effect or process? Trying to even the score and change what history happened. The trust thing is just so hard to rebuild. Every time we start down the path of trust building W has some other thing pop out.

W just doesn't get it that I have been here waiting and trying to save the marriage.. This while W was out at fantasy camp for 4 months. Even when the D was what we were heading for I was still holding the pieces together.

Now it is a tit for tat sitch. Very frustrating. Like being stuck in the mud with your car and having only 4th gear...spin those wheels baby, spin those wheels. But never get out of the mud just build a rut. Other areas of the relationship have moved forward to being better than pre-bomb, but the trust area is still mired and spinning those wheels.

[aliveandkicking]

I bet "piecing" will be a good section for you to check out.

In my case, my H left and had an A about 6 years ago. Through the years, his rationale changed. Sometimes it was "ok" because we were separated (he left to have an A with her), sometimes he was sooo sorry, sometimes it was my fault because I had been such a b*tch and didn't ML enough.

On top of it, yes he was way harder on me for things I did and sometimes my mouth would just drop...I could forgive and move forward and he would just hold on to any ammunition.

I'm not sure what others advice will be whose R turned out better than ours did. Looking back I see that his mentality of blaming me and holding me responsible for his actions and happiness (or lack there of) were what led to him leaving again and causing more damage. And, yes, I have emails where he owned up to his guilt and responsibility for having done that but ultimately, his mentality didn't change enough to foster a healthy, grown up R.

Can you go into therapy together?

For now, I think she is still working her way out of the fog and it will take time to see how she behaves and perceives things. The book "After the Affair" is great and useful for you to do together.

[Doingitright]

Thanks. We have been attending MC for 5 weeks now. It is going well. Seems like recently we have a great session and a great breakthrough each time. The challenge is TRUST issues. We can’t erase the past and I try not to go back there as it is sooo very painful. But we travel back at least once a week to get our fill of pain due to W’s curiosity about what I was doing during her 4 month fantasy camp time.

W insists it was not an EA. Even though the emails were about $ex, garments being worn and being in each others arms blah, blah blah etc etc. W will not read anything regarding such.

We are not in a financially sound situation so W was pissed off when she saw the charge for using DB counseling. I said it was for me to be able to get on with life. At the time W would not go to counseling. W has admitted she never want to fix things with me during that dark time. But she has this uncanny ability to forget things like that. Of course I related the funds to the equivalent of her cell phone bills jacked up b/c of OM communications for several months in the hundreds of dollars.

Don’t get me wrong things are 1000% better than the dark times. We just keep slipping back on this same thing over and over again. It has been only 4 weeks since things have been “good” so I think it is too soon to think this will go away or subside. I just have this curiosity about what others have experienced on this “flipping of who is worse”/ the “justification/blame game” and the trust subjects.

[aliveandkicking]

Check out piecing...

I think it is totally normal but ultimately the reigns have to be put on because tit for tat is not going to work in the long run. I think if you can settle it and make an agreement to put it to bed (what happened during the dark time), that would be great. Should probably happen in therapy.

Hopefully others will chime in.

[sandi2]

Hi, I got distracted but have been trying to catch up on your thread.

I thought my H had a very good answer when I asked him if he could ever trust me again. He said that he had to b/c that was the only way he could live. He is right! It is for the LBS as much as for the WAS. As for trying to even the score or see which one did worse.....that will bury you both! It is a very unhealthy way to try to proceed.

Take every day as it comes. Don't look behind you at what has happen and don't look too far ahead b/c it will make you nervous and anxious. The best thing for both of you would be to make a "pack" to not bring up what each one has done. There must be forgiveness, which is an act of self will. You may not feel like you are forgiveing.....right away, but if you presist, the feeling will come. Then also by your self will, you choose to trust the other person. There may be a difference in forgiveness and trust. Both are by choice, but with forgiveness, the the spouse that did the wrong does not "deserve" it nor can they "earn" the forgiveness. That is like a gift by the forgiver. However, with trust, one may have to prove worthy of that. In other words, if she continues to break your trust in her.....she should not expect you to trust her, right? You can choose to trust her until she does something to break it. I may be wrong about that concept, but I do think "trust" is like "honor" and must be earned.....especially after it was broken. All in all, it is healthier for both sides to forgive and to choose to trust in order to have a good R. If my H had continued to bring up what I had done, I could not have lived with that. Neither could he and we would have ended up with a broken M.

My H chose to trust me again. I have honored that trust by making sure that I do nothing to hurt it. He has proven to me how much he is allowing me "space" and computer time without hovering over me to see what I am doing. At first, I am sure it must have been hard for him, wondering what I was doing on the computer. But, I showed him this site that I was posting to b/c I did not want him worrying. He could relax.

I hope that both of you can agree to put the past behind you and only learn from it and not use it as a sword to pierce each other.

Take care,
Sandi