Well, it's been a week since my last post - what a week! Great progress, and a lot of thinking too.
First of all, Thanksgiving was great, had a great time with my W's parents and aunt / uncle.
MIL kept the kids on Sunday and we drove up to South Lake Tahoe. We had a great time - took a lake cruise, won a little bit gambling, went to see a comedy show. We had such a good time... a lot of affection, kissing - W started to give me a lot of feedback about how she likes to be kissed. I've known her six years - and now we're finally getting to this level of communication and intimacy - she can tell me how she wants me to kiss her.
Went back to the hotel, she went to take a bath and spent a LONG time in there. Came out, said that she wasn't feeling intimate and was stressed out about it.
I decided to make it okay - I started kissing her, very gently, and she got into it - after awhile - we finally did it. She was really happy afterwards - was a bit of a breakthrough for us.
Monday we went skiing and had a great time. W said that this vacation was better than our Hawaii vacation, just that we did so much fun stuff and had a great time together.
Toward the end, I said that I was going to think of this weekend as the point where I finally felt that we were back on track, and she agreed.
Since then, she's withdrawn a bit again. Not quite sure what to make of this, but if she needs space so be it.
I've had a lot of complicated thoughts about our intimate life. I've realized how dependant I am on her feedback - how closed-off she has been. When we're being intimate, in a way she just hasn't been - I don't know - completely responsive, receptive, whatever. I told C that I feel a little pissed off that all the woes of our intimate life seemed to be put on my shoulders, where I'm realizing that the reason I haven't been into it is I haven't been getting what I need from her.
C actually praised me that I FINALLY said that something W did pissed me off. SHe made me repeat it over and over again.
The other thing I'm realizing is how much of what she does I interpret as rejection. Just little things, they build up I guess - if she's distant, if she's not responsive, etc. - I think I really take it to heart, which makes me less eager to initiate intimacy and, well, less likely to even respond. Man, this whole thing is a big mind game with myself.
Stay with me, y'all - I'm not going negative on this, I'm just working through my thoughts.
So - think #1 - bend my mind around so that I don't interpret things this way. W gave me great kisses this morning, however distant she may or may not be, she still loves me, she's not rejecting me. I think the scales are falling from my eyes a bit regarding my emotional reaction to things and the reality. Plus, as my C pointed out, I've been through the rejection fire already with the thread of divorce - I can deal with this stuff.
I think it was a big breakthrough that she's communicating about what she likes - I want to build on that. I want to figure out and communicate what I like.
Thing #2 - I think that I've let her take the lead in our intimate life in a lot of ways, since she's had me so confused. That just doesn't do it for me. I need to take charge of our intimate life. I need to figure out how to engage her better - what she finds romantic, sexy, whatever - and use that to draw her out, make a comfortable, safe, appealing environment for our sex life. I need to get on my feet, get my confidence back. I think, right now, she needs that from me. PLus, if I'm so dependent on feedback, then I've got to provide the stimulus to generate feedback -
Okay, I've got more to write, but need to go now -
