Retrouvaille is from the french word to rediscover. It is a contemplative weekend thinking about your marriage and your life. What you want in life. And talking one on one with your spouse. It's not marriage counseling. It's not group therapy. It's easier to say what it isn't than to say what it is. I've tried to put a lot of info about Retrouvaille on this thread for those who are lucky enough to have a spouse who will go to the weekend with them.
Retrouvaille was great. I really enjoyed it. I think if wife and I went now it would make a differance. There is no way I could get wife to do it agian though. She has told me countless times how she hated it. But I do think it made her reailze what she did and how it affected our marriage. I think timming is inportant and although if we did not go when we did may not still be togeather...if we would have waited until now it would have had a bigger turn around affect. I guess is't damed if you do and damed if you don't... No word from W yet but I am sure they were up drinking late and are sleeping right now.. Gotto get son to school....
Take care Doc
And if I claim to be a wise man, well It surely means that I don't know
Sara was banned from the DB board and her thread drifted into the past. I am resurrecting it so that people who are interested in Retrouvaille can get this information. I have also been to Retrouvaille and had a very good result. There are several others here who have been. Doc (above) and 25yearsMLC come to mind, and Puppy, so there are a few people who can help if I can't.
Sad to hear that. I always got good support and advice from Sara. I too went to Retro, and had a wonderful experience. I can't say enough good things about the Retro program though. Ex really didn't want to go in the beginning and was very hesitant. There was really an amazing turn around in just the one weekend. Not just for us, but you could see it in all the other couples also. Unfortunately, things didn't quite work out as hoped, and divorce finalized back in June. Guess you can't save everyone. LOL. On the brighter side, things are going very well. It's not all bad after the big D.
Me: 44, Wife: 39 M: 17 years T: 20 years Bomb on 08/25/09 1/13/10: MC started 1/28/10, 2/8/10: More bombs 8/28/10: Wife moved out No talk of D, no movement
A friend just reminded me of another benefit of Retrouvaille that I don't believe has been mentioned yet. At the end of the weekend, they give you contact information for all the lead couples who presented their stories to the group. We were encouraged to contact these people with any questions or problems that we ran into after leaving. This was wonderful! My husband and I reached an impasse on something a week or two after leaving the weekend. And since we couldn't agree, we called our favorite lead couple from the weekend and talked to both husband and wife about the issue. i don't remember now what they said, but at the time, it was exactly what we both needed to hear. And we resolved our problem and went on. It was wonderful to know that those people cared personally about us and were available if we needed them.
