In a nutshell, my W gave me the ILYBNILWY about a month and a half ago. She harbors a tremendous amount of resentment and anger towards me for my behavior towards her for the past 4-5 years. No affairs on my part but I was emotionally unavailable, angry most of the time, and rejected the love that she so freely gave me due to my own issues. In June she decided enough was enough and checked out of the M but didn't tell me until the end of July. Since then, I've done a 180 in my behavior towards her and my son. I realized that the way I was living my life was detrimental to me and the people I loved. I've apologized to my W for my behavior, shown remorse for my actions, and have begun work on myself to be a better person.
Despite my change, over the past 2 months, she has begun a cycle of her having an EA with her ex-fiance, a PA (verified one time event), and her adamantly stating about 2 weeks ago that she wants a separation and can't stand to be around me. I balked at the idea of her leaving and begged her to stay and work on our M (classic mistake); however, I also set a boundary that if she continues to live under the same roof as me, the affairs stop.
On September 5, I let her go and told her I would not stop her from leaving. Since then we've been talking a lot about us and her feelings towards me. I've been actively listening, validating her feelings, and respectfully disagreeing with her when I felt it was appropriate. She initiates all of these conversations. On Sunday night she told me that she's re-evaluating everything and that whatever I'm doing is having an effect on her. I told her that I'm here if she wants to stay, I will not stop her from going either, and that staying means no inappropriate contact outside of our M or I'll pack her bags for her.
I really need some advice from those of you who are more experienced here. I'm in unchartered territory. I actually started to begin using the last resort method but I feel that will backfire here. I want to continue to actively listen without pursuing (what I'm currently doing), and buy some more time to work through this. I'm convinced that we have a chance if we can deal with the anger and resentment. Any advice or strategies on my sitch would be appreciated.
Me-43 W-41 S-3 M- almost 7 W ONS affair - 8/9/10, confronted 8/30/10 Separation - Pending My sitch
