Yes. She knows that if she wanders off to do a trial run with this old flame she is risking me losing patience, moving on, finding someone else, changing my mind...
I'm not talking about eventually. I'm talking about, if she leaves to date this OW, then you begin to date as well, and you let her know that.
When my wife and I were piecing, and openly talking about separation, I had always had a short list of "dealbreakers" (boundaries):
1. No dating other people.
2. We MC while separated.
3. We agree to a formal financial relationship and budget -- who-pays-for-what.
I wanted #1, because I wanted to know if her desire for "space" was just the standard script of "I want space so that I can pursue others," and maybe even thought she had her eye on someone specific. And my suspicions were raised even further, when she consistently FOUGHT me on #1 -- it was a DEALBREAKER for her.
Well, after a few months of this, I finally changed my mind. I was okay with the separation, and told her that upon reflection, I was actually looking forward to dating a little. Nothing serious, but just the opportunity for each of us to see what's out there, to see if we would miss each other, and we would date each other as well.
Well, you could have knocked her over with a feather! Suddenly SHE had a problem with the arrangement, and she was EXTREMELY upset that I wanted to date! I held my ground, calmly, told her there was no one specific in mind (there wasn't, but she didn't believe me), and that of course she was free to date as well.
All it took was ONE date of mine for my wife to want to FULLY reconcile!
Look, Amy, I'm strongly against the whole "Bo-Peep" thing, where you let them be with their OM/OW while you patiently wait for them to come home, wagging their tails behind them. If you spend ANY time looking at my past posts, you'll see that. But if you DO agree to it, you should damned well better let HER know, that YOU will be dating as well!
