Wife filed for divorce...Is there still hope?

[dday101798]

dday,

I hope I someday find the success you have in my R with my W. I keep positive, but I have not tried to do anything, but detach and focus on the kids and me lately.

And THAT is all YOU can do.

My point was and is, currently in your situation which is young in it's unfolding, is that yes, 95% of the time your W's attitude towards you will not be that great, and at times be even down right nasty if you (generally speaking as the LBS) continue to do the things that don't work. The saving grace, of which I am learning from my own former WAW is what you do with that 5% of the time when she sees you as the you she once loved whole heartedly. That one occassion I acted upon, if I hadn't, I probably might not be where I am now. We had that 'usual discussion' of her "wanting to be friends", to "possibly start feeling something again", yet still tra-lala around town with OM. And as always, I stood my ground and my boundry and told her what I ahd always time and time again, 'I refuse to be "friends" with MY WIFE whom goes 'home' to someone else at the end of the day".

And, in her state of mind at the time, she could understand what I was saying, but she dug herself so deep in a hole with that, she didn't know what to do. I was no longer there as her safety rope. I cut her off at the knees financialy. I kicked her out of the house to go live with her OM. I gave her what she "wanted", me out of her life, and I re-enforced that time and time again. She wanted out of that hole, but she wasn't sure the M would ever work again, she knew she still loved me, not him, but, "what to do?". And at the end of that conversation, her face screamed it, and she was legitamately weepy eyed as our eyes connected and felt each other internally as she said she was leaving. When she slowly walked past me, I grabbed her forearm (gently of course) and held out my other hand gesturing a hug is "ok", and she embrassed it (hard) for that 5 long hard mintues and cried on my shoulder.

Today, 9 months later, I ask her as I had then, "what was that all about?" "If you were with him, why did you hold on so hard or long?". Today I get the answer that she knew, when she walked out that door afterward, the moment would NEVER happen again. But it gave her hope that someday I would forgive and understand her and why she was where she was at the time.

Someone commented that for the WAS, when the moment comes where they want to come back, it becomes a hard decision for all the very same fears the instilled upon the LBS, rejection, humility, loss of self worth, possible retaliation from the LBS causing extreme insecurity, just to tip the ice berg. And I can say, from the lips of my (x)W, this is ever so true. She has learned her lesson. She has pained herself more than ANYONE direct or remotely involved with the situation. Thus, I need not have any fear of her straying again. In the irony of it all, she is afraid that one day I might just up and leave my darn self.

And here is where the heart and sole of investment in a true reconcilliation comes in:

Would I leave her? Would I leave her after everything I lost? Our home, my family, her family, darn near every friend we had, the financial fallout, the damage to our children's lives forever? Would I leave her? No. Why? She has my utter most RESPECT to own up for all the things she has done and have the courage to do what is right, and approach me, expecting me to tell her to go to h,e double hockey sticks, and ask for the opportunity to have everything back she swore she despised. All because, I took that opportuinty, for that 5% to let her know in the smallest of ways, if she undid the wrongs she had, she could have that opportunity.

"Success"?

Yes, in the terms that we are together. Yes, in the terms that we understand each other in ways we never understood. Yes, in the terms we each as individuals understand oursevles more than we ever have. Yes, in the terms our love for each other will NEVER be taken for granted again.

But, it comes with a price. As said, all that we had lost. No more family holidays to date. We tried a family Christmas dinner with my family, absolute disaster and will probably never happen again. Her family is entirely disbanded from each other. Our children whom are teens shaking and crying in fear when the slightest disagreement gets loud.

So, with that long winded post, whoever wants to try and tell me that WAS's have ZERO feelings, probably made them that way. Sieze the little opportunity you can.