To DB, or not to DB, that is the question.

[Psych77]

Disclaimer: The following post includes advice on which the poster has no right to speak, given his own history. Reader discretion is advised.

I just wish I could be rid of this constant anxiety though. It's unrelenting and I feel like I'm always on edge. Ah well, I guess it's normal given the circumstances.

That is what GAL is supposed to help you with.

Believe me, I am in the same boat! But the more we both allow ourselves to get anxious over the outcomes, the more we undermine our own efforts. We are more tempted to abandon our changes, more likely to lose our tempers when the spouse does something that looks like a step backward. And even apart from these things, I think the spouses can tell when we are hanging on their actions toward us. And it only makes the situation look that much more unstable to them.

Let me share with you an insight I recently reached. When W and I started seeing each other, I already had a life. I had friends I loved, I was knowledgeable about things that were important to me, and we loved discussing those things. I went out and enjoyed activities, had nights of regular meetings to which I looked forward, and was valued by others.

When W came into my life, she added to it - she was a bonus, something wonderful that made my good life better than I ever thought it would be.

Once we got married, all that changed. I was less involved with other things, I didn't worry about valuing or loving myself, because she was there, and she gave me affirmation and company. Where she had formerly been a wonderful addition to a good life, she was now a necessary component to a good life. Instead of maintaining the basics of a good life myself and letting W push it over the top into "wonderful," I got lazy and let her contribution to my life mean that I had to do less to keep it "good." She was no longer a "bonus," but a "basic." She was no longer an "abundance," but a "need."

As a result, any time she started to be even a little less present for me, I would get upset, feel threatened, become angry.

I imagine she perceived it, too. All of her efforts used to be met with my delight; she made my life brighter just being there. How disappointing would it be? Now, all her contributions to my life were just regarded as maintaining the bare minimum, and any decrease in her contribution to my life was viewed as a deficit. You call that motivating?

I think you see my point. In reality, we do need our spouses. They have carved a niche in our lives which they must now fill. They must be the parent only they can be, the provider and/or partner on whom we now rely. But their personal presence, their relationship with us, the most personal way in which they are in our lives - this should not be a need or expectation. We should be complete people without them, their closeness to us received as just an extra helping of pleasure in our lives.

And we do that by GAL. By meeting our own needs and thus being someone who wants their presence in our lives without needing it. I think your husband would be happier to know he is your favorite, rather than your requirement. That, having everything you need (emotionally) and having the choice to be with or without him, you would still rather be with.

At least I am working on the theory that this is what my W wants. And, as insinuated above, I struggle with actually doing this.

Boil it down, what I am saying is GAL, do things that make you happy and meet your own needs, and this may help to minimize the anxiety you are feeling. And it can have the added benefit of making you look more desirable to H, and taking your pleasant responses to him as coming from a genuine regard for him, rather than posessiveness.

Good luck.