No, Puppy, please keep beating me up. I appreciate every word and your efforts. If I need it, I need it. I am NOT on here to hear nice words, although sometimes I do need that. I'm here to make my M work, to bust the D, and whatever I need to do/hear, I need that. I am out to win.
Like I said, he started with the entitled, defensive attitude, but when I softened my tone, he followed suit and came out with it all on his own. I saw that as a babystep. He said he couldn't talk to me, and now he was talking to me. He has been defensive and angry in his tone, and now twice he's been kind and gentle in his tone (yes, it started off defensive, but then got soft and gentle as he explained what had happened.)
I also have in mind at all points that in his mind he is still "over" me, he will never love me again and our M is as good as done. "I" know that can change, but he does not right now... so I don't want to do anything to push him. It's my pushy, overbearing, controlling attitude (from his view) that pushed him to this point. I used to be sweet and kind and nice, but not a pushover - back before I had to be a mother, housekeeper, and caretaker - back when it was just us in an apartment having fun as a couple. Once all the added stuff got put on our M, things started going downhill. We were friends and had fun together. In a dysfunctional way, he's trying to find that friendship with OW, but all they seem to do is go and drink to excess.
Now that I've explained my POV, I'm going to carefully consider and replay the whole mess in my head using your tactic and see what I believe the outcome would have been. Thank you for your input, I'm going to spend a good amount of time running this back and forth through my movie reel.
