My Situation - any thoughts or ideas

[pookie69]

Friendly, not friends.

Will she bring her present/future BF to dinner with you and your kids?

Would you do the same?

[XYZ]

So do I tell her that now? We've both said that we would be friends. Do I go home tonight and say, "by the way, I can't be your friend? I can be friendly and civil, but we won't be friends. Starting now." What does that do to my chance of reconciliation?

[pookie69]

So do I tell her that now? We've both said that we would be friends. Do I go home tonight and say, "by the way, I can't be your friend? I can be friendly and civil, but we won't be friends. Starting now." What does that do to my chance of reconciliation?

Make her think about losing a best friend.

[XYZ]

What do you think is the best way to do that while not shutting the door on reconciliation?

[XYZ]

She already told me that being friends is a great gift to our kids. I don't want anybody (including her) to think that I'd do anything to hurt them.

[PMA_Baby!]

YOU GAL and become ATTRACTIVE again so she would want to be YOUR friend.

Anything else would be interpreted as you pursuing her.

[pinhead]

XYZ,

I've been where you are now. Your wife is the same age as mine; I have two kids.

I've tried everything to make my M work since the Bomb. Got in great shape (running 5ks now), did a lot of inner soul searching and changed a lot of my behaviours. Restarted a lot of hobbies as well as aiming for a new, rewarding career. Did a ton of 180s, and made a huge dent in our family debt.

Guess what it's gotten me?

Nothing.

Just some more stress, some time with my kids that I'd have missed out on.

A wife who says she'd leave me if it weren't for our kids, but she'll "do anything" to make me stay. But she won't say "I want you to stay." Has no attraction to me.

Read my boring sitch. We all think our sitchs are special snowflakes. They're not. Most are extremely similar if not identical.

I wish I had done things differently after discovering this site. Instead, I picked and chose from the advice for stuff that I liked, that reinforced my beliefs. Well guess what, my beliefs were wrong.

I should have said "You want your space? Go ahead, move out." Barring that, I should have said I'm moving out.

I've wasted four months, and possibly ruined any chance at salvaging my marriage. But for me, I know what didn't work: trying to be her friend; trying to be nice; trying to hold/cling to her when she didn't want it.

Now I'm belatedly moving out because I don't want to live with someone who's willing to trade sex for financial security. When I type it out like that, I realize how screwed up it is!

Learn from other poster's mistakes.

A good post to read is Gucci's "Setting them free."

[pookie69]

Pin,

Don't discourage him. It's only been couple of weeks since his bomb.

[pinhead]

I'm not trying to discourage him, exactly the opposite. I want to encourage him to take action that will be effective.

[XYZ]

Sorry if I'm being thick and I want to follow the tough to hear advice.

What I'm doing now: GALing, not initiating contact, no ILY, being happy and nice around her, all that. All the while playing with kids a ton, busting my rear around house, etc.

I'm NOT pursuing in any way.

However, I have said to her (and she to me), that we'd be friends. And it has come up several times. I think, in fact, that it makes this easier for her since she can visualize it.

My question is: Should I blatantly come out and say "I will not be your friend" or should I just go along as is.