Here's a novel idea.... the WAS that left you because they didn't want to be with you is suddenly spending more time with you, suddenly communicating with you more often, doing things with you, smiling with you, is comfortable with you. Keep doing what you're doing! Don't bring up relationship talk, talks of reconciling, enjoy the moment! Stop worrying about the future, you don't know what tomorrow will bring so stop worry about tomorrow, enjoy today if today is the day your WAS wants to talk with you and share a drink or a meal with you or wants to do something with you & the kids. Be humble and appreciate the time you have with them, don't hasten the process and demand that things have to change and that you need to reconcile at this moment. Consider this a form of dating even if it isn't officially labeled as such. Stop forcing your spouses to have to be with you. If you have to force someone to love you and be with you, do you really want to be with those people? If those same WAS's make moves towards you, to communicate, to spend time with you & your children, to come over, to share a meal, etc. Enjoy that time you have with them, celebrate a success internally with yourself that you were able to accomplish something of such a grand nature when this WAS originally left you and never wanted to interact with you anymore. Stop asking for more, start appreciating what you have and stop believing that you deserve more than what you have - truth be told no one deserves anything, you get what you get in life because you placed yourself on that path to get the results you received. Stop believing you are entitled to something, entitlement breeds resentment and that will lead you down a path of anger & disappointment and poor results.
robx-
I hope MWD is mining these boards for material for her next book, because there is some really good stuff here, and your post is golden. Her first book DB was good, and DR was better. As this stuff is hashed over and over on the boards, and as some of the members here become experienced "gurus", I think the concept of DBing continues to be refined.
In my opinion, the DB and DR books should be expanded to include more material on how to DB, and stay sane, when an affair is involved, and that's why I snipped out your particular paragraph to discuss. Given how prevelant affairs are in situations here, I think your paragraph is ignoring a very important issue.
I don't know if you've followed my sitch or not, but that paragraph describes mine in spades. My W is doing everything as you describe, and my instinct is to just enjoy it, let time go by, and see what happens. I have no desire to rush to reconciliation or force my W's hand. However, my W is involved in a long distance affair, so I don't feel I should just give her a free pass, and let her cake eat. I asked her if she'd like us to spend time together and go out and have fun, and she quickly said yes, but I had to "spoil" the good vibes and tell her I can't do it if she's still involved with someone else. That turned our fun light moment very heavy. I was insisting that "things have to change", something you say not to do.
Do you think your advice still applies even if an affair is ongoing?
