The latest with me

[BeginningAgain]

Romeo,

I believe your overthinking this stuff too much as far as how to react to your wife. Regardless of whether you reconcile or not, it is much more healthier for your D6 if she sees a positive relaxed interaction between you and your W. My advice is to just treat your W like you would a very good friend. If a friend of yours made you a pie wouldn't you tell them thank you and how good it tasted? Do the same with her. You don't have to be standoffish. If you see her at a joint function, say hello, ask her how she is doing. You can usually tell when the conversation has run it's course, so don't over extend it, but be polite and friendly. I know it can sometimes be a fine line, but for the most part just be yourself.

BA

[ImprovedRomeo]

I hear what you're saying but it's hard to imagine her as a very good friend, a good friend wouldn't hurt me this way over and over especially when there's DD is involved. When I see her I see a selfish person. It's hard for me to look at her and have feelings for her because I don't even know who I'm looking at anymore. She's not the same person I married and I'm sure she feels the same way about me.

Besides, I keep being the passive one letting her control the situation which keeps me in a limbo i.e. is she seeing lawyers? when is she filing? if she's filing maybe I should beat her to it? what if she's not? maybe she'll see the light and come back? if she comes back then what? she'll leave whenever she wants...again.

All these questions run through my head all day long. Maybe I should file and give her what she wants.

[BeginningAgain]

Well I guess that all depends on what your long range goal is. Is it reconcilliation or is it divorce? The answer to that question will drive to a certain extent what course of action you need to take next.

BA

[ImprovedRomeo]

BA, the long range goal would be to have my family back and for all of us to be happy. But is it even possible if her solution to R problems is to flee? Two, since she's already come back and left I think she might already be done trying to salvage our R/marriage. So would it be false hope for me to wait on her until her next move?

BA, sorry to hear about your friend

[BeginningAgain]

I hear you Romeo - I've been in Limboland for the better part of almost 2 years, it's no fun. All I'm saying is that if you still have it in your heart that you want to reconcile with her, then being standoffish when you are in the same room with her is not going to necessarily push you in the direction of reconcilliation. Sometimes you have to start over and be friends again before you can be husband and wife. It seemed to me, and this is only my opinion from what you described, that in the last episode when you were together you were doing more to push her away then build a bridge.

Thanks for mentioning my friend. It's a hard pill to swallow right now and I'm very concerned for her daughter.

BA

[ImprovedRomeo]

BA, I can't imagine how lonely the little girl must feel. My D is almost 6 so I feel it close to my heart. Like you said I really hope her aunts/uncles and dad even step up to the plate.

See this sort of stuff makes me mad at my STBX even more, why this nonesense when things could be so much better, happier together if she would just work on them with me.

I don't believe I did specific things to push her away or at least that wasn't the intent. I had asked her several times to go to Retrovaille or read relationship books or discuss with me her issues or tell me what I can do to make her happy (even when things were good) - she never did any of it. I felt she always had one foot out the door waiting for things to get even a little bit bad and sure enough 2-3 weeks is all it took from us going to camping, having dinners together etc to 'see ya'.

[alice444]

Jamie, we're so much alike...hint hint haha - I know exactly what you mean by being shy and people thinking you're stuck up - that's me. I did try to think of her as my neighbor who brought a pie over I guess I could treat her that way but I really don't think she'd want to have sex with me...LOL I kill myself sometimes.

Ah... we even have a similar sense of humor! You know, when my D was old enough to observe me, I consciously started making an effort to be more talkative and less stand-offish with strangers b/c I don't want her to be painfully shy, if I can influence it or not. You know what? It's made ME more comfortable talking to people myself, even though it started off just for her Yeah, I can't help you with the sex with a neighbor part- just don't want you to be overly concerned with what you're projecting and to be relaxed and breezy/cheerful (you know I struggle with the same thing you do, so it's easy for me to suggest to someone else!) to take back some power.

mind, I don't know what's changed, maybe the atmosphere here is affecting me. I'm thinking about this stuff a lot more than I was initially. I'm questioning if my behavior is pushing her further away or not. If I go back to my bahvior a few days ago in a nutshell it was 'I don't care what she thinks, does or feel anymore' and that would be stand-offish to her. It would mean I won't talk to her unless i had to regarding DD or something important like taxes etc or unless she asked me. But is that helping me or not? Should I continue that behavior?

Have you sat down and analyzed or gone back through your posts/journalling to identify what results you got with which behaviors? It might help if you had some kind of evaluation system so you know what actions get what results- even if you can't figure out all of them, there might be a few that stand out?

[alice444]

I hear what you're saying but it's hard to imagine her as a very good friend, a good friend wouldn't hurt me this way over and over especially when there's DD is involved. When I see her I see a selfish person. It's hard for me to look at her and have feelings for her because I don't even know who I'm looking at anymore. She's not the same person I married and I'm sure she feels the same way about me.

Besides, I keep being the passive one letting her control the situation which keeps me in a limbo i.e. is she seeing lawyers? when is she filing? if she's filing maybe I should beat her to it? what if she's not? maybe she'll see the light and come back? if she comes back then what? she'll leave whenever she wants...again.

All these questions run through my head all day long. Maybe I should file and give her what she wants.

Ah... I can see myself here, too, except I think my H is thinking more like how you're thinking (even though I'm still feeling unsure myself about what HE's doing). I think it would make you feel a little better if you could either say "I don't give an F what she's doing" or if you could take the initiative yourself- at least to consult with an L and talk about the situation so you see where you stand. As people have reminded me, it does not mean you are ready to D, it's just information gathering to protect yourself, and the byproduct might be you feel a little less at her mercy and powerless, too.

I hope you do some stuff for yourself this weekend and have some FUN! Do something that will make you laugh- it helps a little :-)

[ImprovedRomeo]

Jamie, that's an excellent suggestion. Maybe I should do it for my DD (who btw isn't shy at all like her mom - who can talk to anyone on any topic) and see if it works for me.

As for analyzing posts from before no I haven't done that I really don't feel like putting in a lot of effort into it. Besides, since my contact with her is so minimal (i've only seen her twice in 3-4 weeks for short periods of time when exchanging DD).

Yeah the L etc is a good idea but I can't be bothered with it all right now - that's how I feel.

I'm doing chores this afternoon, mtn biking tomorrow and then I'll have DD on Sun+Mon. Hope you're having a good time at your friend's.

[flowmom]

So maybe I should just be myself...I don't know about my good part...I don't think I have a good part

Tell us 7 good things about you SR...I dare you