Your H and mine sound like they could be brothers.
I so agree that if filing is the only way that you can protect your kids and yourself then by all means do what you have to do.
Your H is very early into his journey and you can do yourself a favor and dial down the expectations to zero. He's no where near done yet. MLC is such a long process. 2 years is considered a short one. I believe there are also different levels as far as the depth of the MLC. Some seem to go in so much deeper than others.
Your H is still in Replay. He's confused and depressed and trying to use alcohol and ow to fix himself. He hasn't figured out that only he can look internally and face his issues and recover his happiness, that it doesn't come from external forces. Sure ow and booze temporarily deaden the pain, but it keeps returning to haunt him. It's where his remorse and tears come from. He can't figure out why the longer it goes on the less the band-aids help.
On some level he may be realizing that he messed up but he has no tools or ideas on how to fix it. He hasn't traveled that far yet.
There are no guarantees that he will ever come out the other side, but if he does and you are both interested in Ring, a D paper won't stop you.
Your H may be waiting for you to file so he can say I'm not the one who filed, she did. Even if he does, remember the reasons you did. It was to protect the children and yourself while he's in this destructive mode.
I know your fear, just remember at this point you really don't have a marriage. It doesn't mean that you won't have a chance to build a new one in the future with him if you both so choose.
Please go into this with no expectations that it will wake him up. From what you report, he's no where near there yet. Would you really want him back if he was forced into it or would you want him back when he was ready to commit to really working on the M?
