K4D Rising #4

[25yearsmlc]

sure K4, pretend that Kerry & JonF are saying your wife is the scum of the earth and you have to defend her honor, keep pretending that's what Kerry is meant...
Or, better yet, don't deflect.
Good grief. You really don't want to change your life do you?

I can't decide which is the more powerful force in your life, your fear of being alone, or your inertia. Both lead to the other, ironically. The more fearful you are of facing life without your wife, the more paralyzed you are and the more likely you will be to have to live without her forever...and the more inert you are, the more she sees that you are simply waiting around for her, which is totally unattractive to her.

As Kerry & JonF are telling you, GAL, and learn to embrace life with or without her. I agree with them too, that you do not have to have your m restored to get this message of personal health and happiness...getting unstuck...

Fill your life with people and activities and stop telling us why you cannot do that and must stay inside your apartment. If you are so poor that you cannot join an activity UNRELATED to being married or sep, then you need another job or two.

Here's what I told someone who listened, and who is getting back together...and if this doesn't "work" to get you back together, let it "work" the way Kerry's GAL has, and be happy. Stop being stuck...we're all saying the same thing Kevin, but you keep pretending not to get it. Anyhow, here's what I posted elsewhere, to someone asking for support from a "Div Busted!" source...

What Worked for Me
Dear "X",
I think it's so important that we say something about our stories and what we think helped the most for our m's to reconcile and last.

As my signature says, I consider my M restored and finally can say "D busted". Not perfectly fine by a long shot, but we are closer than we've been in a decade and I think we're on our way to having what we once had, a really good M.

If you had asked me 3 years ago, or 2, I would not have said we'd be married today. I'd have given us a 10% chance of staying M.

After piecing for nearly 2 years, we attended Retrovaille, Not b/c we thought we were failing at the "piecing" so much as wanting to be "done" with it, if you know what I mean. Even though no M is ever "done" and we are always works in progress, we needed a boost. And so when we attended Retrovaille, we found that we were able to reconnect more fully without the past looming over so much. It helped us a lot. Gave us the boost to the finish line, so to speak. But getting to the point where you can even consider going to Retrovaille was the real struggle.

The main thing that turned my situation around in the first place, and that would enable us to go to Retrovaille, was my own DBing. For me and for almost all of us, that meant Detaching, GAL, etc
Letting go helped us get back together, and then forgiveness is what enabled us to stay together. Neither of these was easy.

When H actually left us for a JOB ('adventure") up in the wilds of Alaska... (crazy as it sounds, it was what it was, even though it's not how he saw it then). For me, may as well have called "Alaska" "Alicia" or OW...b/c that's how it felt....but anyhow, he left.

When he was contemplating it, I did the pleading and arguing and if I say so myself, I had a compelling argument that I think would have won a case in front of the Supreme Court. But to H, it was all for naught. He could not hear me. Or he would not. Doesn't matter. He didn't/couldn't hear so... whatever.

I let him go. To put it bluntly, what choice does the LBSer really have when a spouse wants to go? Hard as it is to admit...we really don't have any choice except how we'll treat their departure. They leave, and then we react. At some point, our lives have to be about our actions, not our reactions.
All we control is us.
That was it for me. I got sick and tired of feeling sick and tired, and did not want my kids to see a bitter or sad woman all the time. I did not want to be a model for victimhood OR revenge. They needed to know that all losses are surmountable. We can overcome and be happy again.

So I began to see H's departure as mainly a loss for him, less so for me and the kids. We had each other, after all. (And if he had taken the kids as some WAWs are able to do, I'd have made sure I got half time with my kids. And I'd fill it with good full living). I felt that at some point, whether H was lonely or not, I would not be lonely. I would fill my life with real living, and not waiting. And so I began to GAL. I started making choices I wanted to make without regard to H's career, or feelings b/c after all, he was gone. It started small, with things like seeing chick flicks b/c H was not around so who cares if he'd like the movie? Not about him, not at all. No more toilet seat left up either...(hey, I said start small...)

I saw some positives from this separation for the first time. I really started to embrace those positives. (H noticed this, although I did not know it at the time). For our anniversary I knew I didn't want to be alone, so I chose to take a trip with the kids that I would have preferred to go on with H but alas, since he was not available, we had to go without him. Just before departure he said he wanted to go but it was too late for that. Honestly. So off I went with our children. And we had a blast (We went to Italy, but any wished for trip would have helped me accomplish the same thing; enjoying life as a family even when one member isn't around. We had been in the military and knew lots of families who had fun together even when a member is away....we can all do this and must.)

Unbeknownst to me, h noticed this and ached for our company. While we were busy learning and seeing so much in a totally new place, I didn't think much of h b/c there were no reminders of him, and it was so stimulating, as new places and new activities are. (Hence the suggestion to go on a trip or take a class if it is at all possible). It was very healing for us. I did not do this for attention from H, and in fact would have preferred he not know of the trip and resent it. (Which I think he did, but that was not my problem....) I took the trip b/c I had longed to go there for years and had put it off until h was ready...well, no matter now! I was ready, and I went with some of my fav people; our children.

I think you get the point. There comes a time when you decide you have to LIVE NOW, and you can't keep waiting and checking on the WAS or taking their temperature, or wondering what it might be. You have to let them go. Sometimes they come back and then you have the real work to do. I think the chances of their return increase when you let go and I feel that strongly.

But paradoxically, you have to really let them go for this to work and you have to NOT care if they come back, in order for this to work.

So it ends up that you let them go so you can be happy without them and then either 1) they do not come back and you'll have GAL and moved along into your future that much faster, OR 2) they will come back b/c you let them go.

This is why I cannot understand the long term pursuit of a WAS by an LBSer. It does not work. I do get why it happens at first; we all do it. We argue and plead and whine and nag and cajole and yell and explain and talk and talk and talk....

But if we are lucky, we find DB. If we find DB, we should start to think, "what I was doing isn't really working, is it? So maybe I should try something else", and we begin the 180's - that mainly consist of GAL for us. No more excuses, no more waiting, or "praying for patience" but really just waiting, and no more just hoping and NOT changing ourselves, or taking charge of our lives b/c no one else will take charge of it!

Also saw that I was a fun person, still attractive and still smart and funny, and in sum, I was/am a good catch. I began to picture my life as a single woman in a positive light. Hard at first but I knew widows who were eventually happy, so why not me? Always projected upbeat attitude around H and saw his departure as a mistake on his end but kept it to myself, and accepted it as a mistake he seemed destined to make so I looked at it with resignation but fortitude, knowing I would be fine no matter what his sitch was. I began to see that he was really the one losing out the most, and that even if he seemed or was truly happier without us, that did not matter. My happiness (& the kids) was my focus.

And when I pictured my life without him but made sure to picture it happy, the more detailed the picture, the better I felt. Me happily pursuing my career goals, new hobbies I always wanted to do, spending time with my children and my friends and family and meeting new people and having a good life on my own. Doing new activites became a real goal of mine. Expanding my comfort zone... I became happy again. Tell you the truth, there were some real down sides to being married to my h... that I had to weigh carefully when H wanted us to reconcile. So we have improved most of those things and continue to work on them.

No more victim stuff, no more "making sure WAS knows how much pain I'm in b/c otherwise their guilt might not make them come back" and being blind to the fact that pity is not attractive, and will never get a WAS to come back and stay. Ever..... It just won't. If it did, it would only take a week for it to work.

Being attractive/attracting, is a byproduct of GAL and true Detachment....letting go and not wearing our "purple heart for our wounds", on our sleeves. Not making sure our WAS's know good and well what pain they've inflicted...and how much guilt is on them....why? B/C it does not work! Been there, done that.

Decide if you want to be "right" or you want to be happy. Too many LBSers, (and I was one of them) do not know how to forgive someone or let go of pain. I never saw real forgiveness growing up. But those who quote scripture to get their WAS back rarely succeed (never seen it personally) and as I said, guilt won't get them to stay...even if it temporarily gets them back. Frankly, it seems to send most of them running faster and farther away. Can't see how shaming someone helps restore a M even if got them back into the house. And in the end, if you want them to come back b/c they're healthy and want to restore the M in a truthful way, the guilt has to go. Is that "just"? Who knows?

Is forgiveness fair? I don't know but I do know forgiveness and letting go are essential to the well being of a marriage but I see a lot of LBSers who hold onto their resentment for a long time, and then they wonder why the piecing did not work. They are sometimes punitive, using "rebuilding trust" as their excuse to punish or shame their returning spouse. There is no need or use for that. At Retrovaille my h suddenly began to cry about the pain he inflicted on us and the damage to the Rs he has with our d's and I cried for/with him. No need for me to add to it. He "got it". But when I told an LBSer gf of mine this small story, she asked me if I "reminded h of all the hurt he had caused" and I was agape. She didn't "get it". She thought I should rub salt in his wounds. (??) She is still an LBSer without her h...and she's one angry woman...

I can only wonder how many LBSers are like that. Good God, what is the goal!?? If it's suffering you want the WAS to feel, then sue them for div and take them to the cleaners...but if you want a happy m, or just a happy life, then let your pain go. You are the one holding onto it (Peaceful, I'm not directing this at you personally, hope that's clear....)

Anyhow, I thought I'd post this so that people know there are couples who make it, even through this DB experience. See BrandNewDay, safflie, sandi2, faithfulH, or Orich for more. There are others too, but many times we don't keep posting here for a variety of reasons including that our spouses wish for us not to share any private info, or b/c we don't feel we "belong" here anymore.

But I Hope this helps you remember that not all is lost if you are here. And I mean that even if your div is not busted. ALL of the people I know who "worked the DB program" well, are happier now regardless of what happened in their M. They take charge of their own happiness and that seems to me to be the essence of the DB method of solution based therapy. Find what works, do more of it. Don't do what doesn't work. Work on you, let go of who and what you cannot control, and Be happy.

J-