Leo, there are so many difficulties in this process: maintaining patience, being upbeat and friendly in light of a WAS' ambivalence, working hard to GAL, making sure your efforts are truly about you and not her, wanting her to notice but not asking, needing reassurance but not asking, wanting to scream at her that you're working so hard and she isn't or doesn't seem to care, getting positive feedback only to receive something negative shortly thereafter, etc. It's a roller coaster ride, plain and simple.
I do not have any words of wisdom but I will repeat here something of Sandi's that has given me a lot of freedom: you cannot prevent your W from doing anything nor can you get her to do anything. If your State is a no-fault D state then she can leave legally when she wants and you cannot stop her. I do not write this to be negative. On the contrary, when I finally accepted these ideas (truly an on-going struggle), it helped me to understand that the GALing that I was doing could not be about her, that it had to be about me because she was going to do what she wanted to do regardless of what I did. IOW, I could become everything that she said she always wanted and she could still leave. Knowing that helped focus me on why I was doing what I was doing: for me, not her. I admit that I want my M to work and I want to reconcile but I also feel like I am going to come out of this process stronger and more confident and more capable of being in a loving relationship in the future (with my W or without) and all of that will be the result of the work I did. Just my two cents. Hang in there, my friend.
