i didn't say i did this. but the advice here is usually .. ask, validate, etc.
i have asked my stbxh on many occasions what he wants. sometimes i like to just surprise him by showing him i learned something about his hobby or his interest. it shows that i have been listening to him and it's not just garble.
he would want a particular brand of scotch. i would make a call to get it reserved and shipped to the store nearest where we lived. he got it for christmas last year.
i would asked him if i was getting better at intimacy. i would ask what he liked or didn't like.
the one thing that i am guilty of is .. i journal my thoughts and my thoughts never leave the pages of my journal. after the first year of my marriage, i wanted to walk away. i had written a long letter to my stbxh telling him why i was walking away.
i never sent that letter. to this day, i never told him that i wanted to leave after our first year together. i'm sure if i told him now, he would say "see, i knew we both wanted this." i watched my position in his priority queue get lower and lower. then i became disposable.
maybe i was replaced by someone more important. someone who would give him everything he wanted. i always said that i was preparing him for his real wife. he didn't like hearing that. but i always had this feeling that he would leave me. and he did.
