Thank-you so much for the support and understanding. In everything that I have looked at and the people I have talked to DB is the only one I have found that is truly in favor of fighting for your marriage.
As far as the suicidal issues and anger I have made leaps and bounds in those areas. The anger I dealt with by reading a great book called "Anger Busting: 101" and is very solution oriented like DB. I went to therapy for the suicidal thoughts and my wife knows about all of it because I had to stay in the house and I am on her insurance. The fact that I am in a truck by myself most of the time and communicating with my wife only via text is beneficial for those intense times because she can't see me break down and I have time to think of a good response to conversations.
I wanted to ask her to do counseling with me before but knew it wasn't a good idea at the time. I knew I had to show her I was changing and not blame her.
I have avoided being openly needy except for our pets which are like children. She knows I don't want this and she just keeps telling me nothing will change it. She told me she doesn't care if I changed, she doesn't want me back and she wants a new life. Since it has been months of basically doing the last resort technique I reread “The Divorce Remedy” and saw where it said that sometimes being too soft is a turn-off and to take a firmer stand. I tried doing that somewhat by saying that I could come home from driving every 2 weeks and stay at the house to help with the cats and chores. It would be up to her if she wanted to be in the house with me or not. She told me she couldn’t handle me being home every 2 weeks and would just need to move so I could have the house. Now that I have officially been given some papers both my parents and in-laws (who I am staying with right now and are attempting to stay neutral) have already told me that I have no reason to be soft with the house since she has made up her mind. As I told both of them, if I just tell her that I am going to be in the house whether she likes it or not or I just start showing up whenever then I might as well go ahead and sign the papers because it will do nothing but make matters worse.
I can put on the confident act, but not too strong, not too pushy, not angry or blaming (though subtle blaming is the mistake I made yesterday) but don’t know how she will see it. She doesn’t want to talk to or see me, she is dating another guy and his stuff is in the house, and even when I want to visit the pets she leaves before I get to the house and won’t come back until I have texted her and told her I have left. To make up for the firmer stance on the house I told her that when I come home next time I am not asking or expecting to stay in the house, just that I want to visit the pets. I have been trying to flood her with appreciation for these small things.
If I could afford to do the telephone coaching I would do it in a heartbeat. I am going to be careful with my money and see if there is anyway I can get it. Whenever I can I am going to check this website and I really appreciate any and all help. I really don’t want to end up in that small percentage of people who has the DB technique fail. I know if I can get her to reconsider we will have a lot of work to do. We will need counseling anyway because there are deep hurts on both sides now.
Thanks to all.
P.S. If anybody wants to give me some quick advice here are the pertinent issues as I see them:
1. Since contesting the divorce is argumentative should I push for the counseling as well?
2. Should I take the economic relief stance since she actually makes more money than me right now? And she is in the house splitting up property on her own right now?
3. Do I stay completely faithful by not dating or having sexual relations with anybody else even though she is? If I do, can I ever mention this to her to prove my commitment or will that just make matters worse?
