Sandi's Place

[sandi2]

Hi GW, always so good to hear from you. I understand the hard times that your M is going through, but I think your W is blessed to have a H who will forgive, listen, and work together till things are right again.

If I could talk to your W, I'd tell her that keeping the A a secret from you (thinking she was protecting you) would not have worked, and the M would not have surrived.

The first reason would be b/c she could not have endured the pressure by herself and the temptation to go back into the EA would have been to great. The fact that you do know will give her more strength to overcome.

The grieving for OM sounds awful, doesn't it? One might wonder how on earth a woman could mourn over him. I believe it's due to the powerful affect of the fantasy the WAW has for a new life with a new man. She puts the two into one....therefore she believes she's truly grieving for OM. And, she is.....but I think most of it was the dream of a happier life.

A lot of it is anger and guilt...and that she just needs to deal with it, bury it, put it in its proper place, continue to move forward with us.

Is this what "she's" saying or what you are saying? If I'm reading it correctly I think you're saying that's her thinking about it. If only it was that way. This must be the military in her... Sorry to say, but she will have to deal with the emotional fall-out. The longer she was in the A, the longer it will take to get over OM. But, also it depends upon if she feeds thoughts of him. It's easy to let the mind wonder back into "what if".

I realize this isn't good news for you, but I think you already knew it.

Guilt I think (yes, mind reading here and putting two and two together) because he carried through with his end of the bargain and she didn't.

Wow! I've had to deal with guilt but not like that. Can you explain how she's angry or how it's directed? That's got to be tough for you to know she feels guilty not keeping her end of things with OM. I'm sure she feels guilty about everything, and especially for being unfaithful to you. I would think all those emotions are doing a big number on her and may be hard for her to always name and put in the proper catagory.

I would suggest that you keep working at keeping the lines of communication open with her. As long as she's talking about her feelings then that's good, but if she starts to shut down or starts being absent for dinners again, then that's not a good sign.

Let me share this, as a WAW who had an EA, I would catch myself resenting my good H. I felt like doggie poop and here he was this wonderful man who I had done so wrong. The truth is that he has always been a good man but I wasn't able to deal with all that I had done to him and then to discover I resented him at times.....added to my confussion. So, I guess what I'm trying to say is try to resassure her that the two of you are in this together. You aren't this "saint" that has forgiven her, the sinner, and now she's got to do all the work by herself. And, you haven't......I'm just trying to make a point. Do you see what I'm saying? She's got to lean on you during this ordeal b/c if she starts trying to handle it solo, she's in trouble. I won't say it's impossible....but it sure is hard.

Continue to assure her that the M is going to make it...in spite of the rough patches and all the anger/guilt. She can't begin to have doubts and wonder if she made the right decision to stay. Always talk positive and encouraging and looking forward more than looking back. Gosh, she's so lucky that you will talk with her "through" this pain. Both of you were hurt due to her actions and it will take both of you to heal. I know you can.

She may wonder why those feelings linger around, but they will begin to fade......jump back up once in a while,but they will stop.

You may have to remind her that the two of you are a team. These are things that I personally feel that a WAW from an A needs to have. Piecing is tough, no doubt about it. It took close to two years for things to feel normal again. I don't usually tell people that b/c it sounds very discouraging.....but it is also realistic and I don't want you to think you are not doing something you should be and that progress isn't happening. It just takes a long time when hearts and lives have been wounded on this level.

I would like to have not had any feeling toward OM and just been numb to all of it, but I think the pain is necessary. After going through all that pain, she's not likely to ever allow her MR to unprotected where she finds herself in this god-awful mess again.

I think you are going a great job, GW.