I don't know I guess I mistook a lot of the advice being thrown my way as negativity. Either way I really don't feel like using more posts to explains which parts bothered me and which didn't. I'd hate to start a flame war when I am here to DB.
Realizing that there are still some big issues I am not happy with in the M, at a personal level I feel I am at pretty big high. These past 5 days have led to a lot of self discovery, I feel in control again. I hope to continue this feeling after I pick her up from the airport tonight. Talked to my dad both yesterday and today. Yesterday focused on what he "didn't" teach me, today we focused on what he did. I come from a long line of entrepreneurs, the knowledge of commerce being passed down from one generation to another. My father passed this to me, unfortunately starting a small business is VERY hard in the US, unlike where my family is from, so I have tabled it until after military retirement. (Wooohooo 38, 11 years to go!!!) Realizing this I am considering starting a small ebay store, talked it over with dad, let him know that I was thankful for passing this "manly" pursuit to me. I feel that this will be a great GAL opportunity for me.
25yrs in your last post you asked me if I was still trying to "close" my marriage. The answer is yes, I have to admit that I allowed that precondition in a moment of weakness, and did not respect my own boundaries. It's something I plan to do something about. In order to do that though I feel that I need to regain my self respect first. She asked for this precondition in a moment of extreme MLC and WAW, because of her actions I feel she herself is not too convinced it is what she really wants. As someone else mentioned, by me "accepting" it I am giving her one less reason to rebel against me. (That doesn't mean I am comfortable with it, and she knows this). At the same time I have been reading Sparks thread who is in a similar situation, and have realized from his own realization that ultimately in a matter like this I can't make this decision for her. She needs to choose me, and only me. Even by finding my own self respect, if I demand of her to not do it. She will only resent me, and this will make things worse in the long run. I want her to be with me, and me alone because she chose to, not because I forced her to. At the same time through DB and NMMNG I am making it more and more attractive for her to choose me and me alone. It is like DB'ers who win back their W's from OM, in my case I am trying to win her back from a possible PA opportunity. Different sitch, same principles. Ultimately I believe that she wants this PA opportunity only because she is trying to fill a void in our R. I hope that through my efforts I can fill that void. If I was able to keep her only to myself for 6 years, why shouldn't I be able to do it now that I am a better person? I am also lucky that to my knowledge a PA has not occurred. Although sometimes it feels like a race against the clock to win her over before this hypothetical PA happens. (I'm sure that is not good DB). Indeed our R has dramatically improved from those tumultuous days 2 months ago, and believe that for every good day we have, it pushes her willingness to do it further away. The hope is to eventually erase this "need" she claims to have.
That being said, what if this all fails? What if she does do the PA, but regrets it. Well I think some soul searching will be necessary in both our parts. I will have to analyze if the M is worth saving afterwards, and she will have to analyze if she is regretful enough to put in the hard work to save the M. I have a feeling that we will both go through what a lot of couples trying to recover from infidelity go through. If she shows no remorse, and decides that this a lifestyle she wants, I will have to do a lot of soul searching and decide if I can tolerate it. Decide what boundaries to set, and how all this all will play out.
The most important part though is that I finally feel that I am happy enough with myself to pull the plug on this crazy scheme at any moment. I think I am strong enough to pull out if she crosses a line I can't handle. I think the scary part is that sometimes I don't know what those lines are myself. (I'm sure once it is crossed it will be blatantly obvious). Something I need to keep working on, and think only I can decide what those lines are.
After all the reading I have been doing I have been wondering if all the strife that has been created in our R has been her own way of getting me to stop being a nice guy. Today I had coffee with a male friend, and we talked about one of our coworkers, and how we both felt like punching him in the face. Where I am a Mr Nice Guy with my W and my W alone, he is a Mr Nice Guy with EVERYONE. We both talked about how we just wanted to punch him in the face to see if he would at least get angry enough to man up. Then we talked about fight club, need to read that book... Anyway it made me wonder if all the horrible things she has said, are just her verbal punches for me to stop being Mr Nice Guy and man up to her. Well whether they were or not, I am committed to manning up for myself. It will be really nice if they help my M.
Gonna go get ready to go pick her up, I have to admit I am not as particularly excited as I would have been in the past. The reason why will have to wait until I make a blog post about her time away and how I reacted to it. I have held off on talking about it, because I wanted these five days to be about ME and not the R. So I have tried to steer the conversations in this thread towards me. (Trust me some good stuff has happened, that I REALLY want to talk about, but I wanted to focus on me this week)
