Brief history: Wife had short-lived EA/PA over the summer. We have been married 12 years, no kids. We are both in the performing arts, EA/PA happened at summer music festival while I was not there. We had just moved, I was at home for most of the time, although I saw her for our anniversary 10 days before PA. We just flipped breadwinner situations-she is now the breadwinner while I finish my doctoral degree. She has promised to support me financially regardless.
She confessed about 3 weeks after EA/PA. She told me she had never been in love with me and was sorry we got married before she actually confessed the EA/PA.
Spent a lot of time crying, groveling, trying to pull myself together. First counselor was a disaster-she thought that we should separate so W could self-actualize and that I should consider dating.
About a month after her confession I learned they had cut each other off-though I think it was TOM who did the cutting. She mourned the whole thing in front of me.
We tried to date each other but her heart wasn't in it. I was trying not to grovel but did anyway. She finally told me she didn't want to spend money on our relationship because she didn't want me. Later that week I exposed the whole thing to her family, who has been proactive in trying to save the marriage and very supportive of both of us.
A cousin led me to DB site last week. I read Divorce Busting already, and have a 180 plan that gets me out of our apartment more, volunteering, spending time with friends, and looking for jobs out of town.
She has been inconsistent- when I started looking at jobs out of town she seemed to show interest in staying together. At the same time, she is furious over exposure and will not touch me. She hasn't worn her wedding band since the EA/PA (with a few exceptions on social occasions). I fear she may be preparing to ask for a D, though I have no evidence of that. Because of residency requirements, we can't start for several months anyway.
OK-can I save this? And with the Holidays coming up, do I respond to her wanting to do things like decorate the Christmas tree?
(Since my original post I have made appointments with a DB coach. Regrettably, a confidant informed me a couple of days ago that my WAW had said she was open to having another affair if the opportunity presented itself. She considers me nothing more than a room mate now.)
She hasn't left. So she doesn't know if she's done yet, or she's still in the planning stages.
I think I might put my educational plans on hold, maybe seek out gainful employment again regardless, given the current environment.
As long as she's there, why don't you treat her like the woman you love? At Christmas, you decorate, so decorate.
If you come to know that she has entered into another affair, I would probably take another tack, but word from a confidant is not enough in my opinion.
Try to soak up the ideas in the book. Make your 180's honest ones - that is, changes that you honestly recognize you need to make to be a better you. Don't start new habits or behaviors just because you think they will endear you to her - just doesn't seem to work in my experience. You're actually likely to get more backlash than compliments.
I still beleive marriages can and should be saved. You will find that it can be painful, and that you will need to do things that sometimes seem opposite of what your gut tells you to do. But it can be done.
You sound calm, try to keep calm. For me at least, the only thing that significantly changes the dynamics and how I would respond to her is knowledge that she is openly involved with another while still living with you. That takes a more serious sequence of steps.
Blessings,
Bill
"Don't tell me the sky is the limit when there are footprints on the moon."
I want to make it clear I know DB does not generally advise this; I was not aware of DB at the time. Counseling had failed and I was trying another well known system that did not yield desired results.
Reasons: she told me she did not want me, some behaviors that I was concerned could lead to physical abuse had emerged, and I was concerned that she was only talking to people who had had affairs and in one case, left for TOM. Her family has been magnificent in supporting the marriage while offering their sincere love.
It was a terrible risk and I have paid a price; hoping it all works out.
In the proper moment, admitting that you would do things differently now, and that you acted out of pain, could be helpful.
But that's a one time deal. Don't turn it in to an excuse to beg and plead. An apology when we've done something we think is wrong is always proper. Raking ourselves over the coals for it is unhealthy.
Bill
"Don't tell me the sky is the limit when there are footprints on the moon."
Bill has given you great, honest, warm, loving advice. And from what I have seen, it is consistently so.
"It was a terrible risk and I have paid a price; hoping it all works out." "Love heals a multitude of sins." Let your love shown in future actions heal the past.
re: education. I am almost finished and offered to take leave, she insisted I not. It is almost a moot point as I will be done in the spring and am looking for jobs for now and next year.
I cannot outearn her though. She has a very high paying job; it was why I left my last position and why we moved last summer right before the EA/PA. In time that may change and she may want to eventually make career decisions that lower her income for more professional fulfillment, but not immediately.
Volunteering: I have changed in the 16 years I have known her, but lack of volunteer work is what I regret most that I did before her. Looking primarily at soup kitchens and animal shelters once a week.
New friends/social interaction: because of relocation and travel to school, I have not had time to work on this yet. I have over the years tended to rely on her for making friends and that needs to change.
Jobs: She needs to look up to me and the income flip was a bad idea. As a performer I could support her again and that was a potential path before the PA. It still is. Also, I have to prepare for the worst. As a performing artist I have to look for professional and academic positions with some dispassion for exact location.
Finally... She wants her space. Aforementioned confidant, who wants to save the marriage and is essentially a spy, thought I should leave for Christmas since she has to work DB coach disagreed and I am staying. Still, I need to GAL. My own.
I wanted to ask a couple of more questions, plus fill in some information I left out in the first post to save time. I wanted to make sure it wasn't too long...
First, about time together and creating an atmosphere in which love is even possible. We have not separated, but travel has been a constant for the last year. Before we moved and before the affair WAW was in NYC a lot during the week. We weathered that ok, including a rather dramatic trip home on the last train out of Penn Station when the big blizzard hit.
I had been teaching public school for 12 years-Bill, I see you know that gig! I was tired, frustrated, and actually did a little counseling for depression last year.
When my WAW was offered her new job in NYC it seemed like a godsend. Not only was the money great but I could take a sabbatical. However, to finish my studies, I have had to be OUT OF TOWN a lot. It was supposed to be 3 days a week but ended up 4 or more many weeks.
Then the affair happened, shortly after we moved.
Revelation of the affair happened 5 days before school started. My offer to take leave was one more of the heart than of reality at that point.
We live within walking distance of my wife's work. Thankfully I can get off the travel roller coaster in a couple of weeks. She has asked me to find a holiday job, though I have been gone so much that is difficult. I am working on finding a real job in New York.
But here's the thing.
She doesn't want me there. I almost cry thinking about it. Even before I exposed her she was starting to treat me terribly to try to get me to leave. I am concerned it is coming again. She doesn't want to have dinner with me, she is rude to me verbally sometimes, and much prefers to spend time with a couple of girlfriends to me. They have been offered comp tickets to her performances instead of me. (The girlfriends are a lesbian couple.) She once told me when I called her on it that if I wanted to be treated better, to leave and find someone else who would.
A family member that desperately wants to save the marriage told me to leave for Christmas because my presence pushed her away. DB coach said absolutely not, and I am not.
But she doesn't respect me. She doesn't want me around. How can I possibly get her respect back if verbal insults start flying, as they have in the past? How can I be there and not push her away as I am trying to GAL. I can be out of the house more and not dote on her, but she really just wants to force me to leave.
Addenda... aforementioned family mem (her side) just told me that I have no (zero) chance of saving the marriage as long as I was home with her. Little affirmation wanted here!
