Mixed Signals or is this Limbo Land

[dwinter82]

I am going to state the obvious...your wife is very confused. You know my approach, would this be a 180 for you?

I think at a minimum you need to really distance yourself from her and give her a chance to miss you, as well as what she will be losing. Right now, it sounds like she is taking things for granted, including you.

The postive thing for you, besides the one year thing, is that she is confused (at least one side of her is showing interest). How do you turn that to your advantage?

[MHL]

I know my wife and I truly believe she is interested in the changes. Yes my wife is messed up in the head, I say that from a very loving perspective mind you, it just amazes me that she is capable of the behavior.

Yes, I need to distance myself from her. Started tonight, she came over to tuck S9 in bed was here maybe 15 minutes, I did not answer the door (she knocked which was weird, her lawyer's advice???) normally she opens the garage and comes on in. She went upstairs, I only went up there briefly to give S9 asthma meds and came right back down. She came back down, I was ready for R talk, didn't come and we said our goodbyes and she left. I need to maintain a little bit of animosity towards her to help distance myself and do the no contact thing. Short term goal is to not initiate contact for 4 days. I will respond but not initiate.

The postive thing for you, besides the one year thing, is that she is confused (at least one side of her is showing interest). How do you turn that to your advantage?

You said it, time to distance but not ignore, if she contacts respond but only half the words she uses, but be nice. Thats the game plan for now.

Still sucks that I am going to drop a boatload of money on a Lawyer. Rather take a week with her in the Caribbean. Maybe I should tell her that......JK. Time to get down to business.

[dwinter82]

I would not let her come over to put the kids to bed. I know that is a rotten thing to say but again, she is doing that to fill a void. She is ultimately making the decisions that will change the dynamic of the family, not you.

I had a stern conversation with my L. I told him I was not made out of money and if I felt like he was not being very effecient with his time, I would find someone else. The more you and your W can figure things out on your own, the less time the L will have to spend.

[MHL]

The reason she came over is b/c earlier in the day we decided that she would come over to the house last night and we would talk about an agreement. I in turn told my S9 when he got home that mom would tuck him in tonight. About an hour later my W texted me and backed out on meeting with me. I did not want to disappoint my S9, so I asked her to come out and tuck him in.
The positive is that she did it, and did not evoke the "distance" thing with me. I just have to mind my feelings and urges, and I think that any contact I do have will still be friendly. Day 1 of not initiating contact.

[ClingingToHope]

The still be friendly part is hard. I was doing well with it up until this week. Dottie the DB counselor told me to act "as if" this is all a phase and it will work out.

But the ups and downs of the holidays really got to me and now I'm meeting with an L on Friday and when W called last night to make several schedule change requests for her job, I just sat there on the telephone stewing.

I'm going to struggle with friendly for the next couple of weeks.

[dwinter82]

I think of my kids when I am struggling with the whole friendly thing although I am not purposely being friendly anymore. I am just being myself.

I do not know about you guys but it seems like at night I always feel better about things, more confident that I can get passed this. Then in the morning everything comes crashing down.

[MHL]

For me the hard time is fixing dinner for my kids. My W exclusively did that, not much else but it reminds me of her absense and that is hard. Work is hard b/c I can not concentrate but am trying to focus on positives and keep the PMA that "I will get my wife back" and envision that instead of "I can't believe this is happening to me and my family". I do not know what will happen but I know what I want to happen and thinking about that instead of the worst helps me stay upbeat.

[ClingingToHope]

DWinter82, I can't say any time during the day is better. I focused on my sitch this morning. I stressed about it late last night.

My appointment with my L is Wednesday and then my IC on Thursday.

[MHL]

When I start to think about it I tell myself "STOP" and I try to change whatever I am doing or walk out of the room or think about something else that is positive.

[MHL]

I feel like I am back on track from my backslide this weekend. Being friendly again and my W is being friendly back, its like the whole confrontation thing at the bar did not happen??? I am going to roll with it and see, still moving forward with the lawyer thing but I feel like if we hammer out this separation agreement then it will be behind us and will no longer be an issue. I had to dig a little in the success stories and found a WAW success story where the wife came back but it was a long road to rcovery after she moved back in. The poster is WAWfighter and if you search his posts you will see some of his threads. His WAW moved back in Nov. 05 here is the link.
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=538845&page=9
I keep finding the same common theme in some of the older threads and it is being your W's friend, and letting her do the initiating of the contact. (I suck at this but did not initiate today!!) WAWfighter even sighted "being her friend" was the biggest key to his success. Also keeping his cool, about the OM and the ongoing A.
If you are getting down, go digging and read a some old threads that are similar to yours and read through them. I especially like to find the same age and similar WAW/affair sitch's. Gives me hope for my sitch.