Another WAW

[25yearsmlc]

Dear Anch,

Wow what a situation and history...only a few things at a time b/c that will be long enough of a post. There will be SOME 2 x 4s for you but mostly they deal with the past. I only say them so you can see your w's point of view and imo, why some of what "Normally works" won't likely in your case.

Many WAWs want divorces to get away from men they have come to dislike b/c of the way the h's have treated them...they were critical, depressivel, controlling,etc. THOSE men need to back off.

I do NOT get that from your w. On the contrary I think you've done a good job at, best case, benign neglect. B/c of the cancer your level of neglect and working too much is worse.

So you have to wake up. Plus you DO have a past of what she views as cheating (and most people here in the position of LBSers feel the same. That making out is as bad as...or so they say...in any event, she felt betrayed and clearly SHE did NOT work it through. YOU HAD but she had not. There's kind of a Big ass difference.

Plus you live in Alaska...dear God I have mixed feelings. Jack3beans loves it there and so did my h. But I did not and for two unrelated reasons.

First, and foremost, my h went native on me and we had LESS time than ever together. After years of him being an MD and residency and all that training I figured he'd FINALLY have family time but all that meant for HIM was more time for HIS hobbies and IF WE joined him...great...IF NOT...so what...I had a newborn and in the interior of Alaska, you don't do a lot outdoors and inside activities are limited there, to say the least.

If you were gone a lot as I suspect, you put her in a crappy place to spend a lot of time alone. When I saw that you wrote, "SHE AGED HERE"...all I could do was slap my forehead and say "OMG get her out of there!"

Finally, she had breast cancer. That's the most intimate of the cancers that show...and it's crucial that a man show his wife MORE attraction than ever.

If I were THEN in a roomie situation I would directly relate it to my h NOT being attracted to me now that I've had breast cancer. Did she get reconstructive surgery?

Even so, most of my friends tell me that only helps them look good in clothes but naked their scars are THEIR scars and they loathe them and fear them.

I saw a film with this issue in it and the h could no longer make love to his w, even though he loved her. But her bf could.

Her OM saw her scars as the "the marks of victory, that she had beaten cancer and that she was all the more beautiful for it, and that he found the scars to be turn ons"....suddenly her affair made sense to me, in the film. Food for thought.

I believe you have grossly underestimated her feelings of undesirability and the "roomate" situation she commented upon, which "you did nothing about" only confirmed that to her. Then instead of seeing you act like a sex starved man, you are looking good and working out and dressing better.

Though WE here KNOW it's GAL - it's also exactly what men/women do when they plan to leave their spouse.

Hello,

I have been reading these forum threads for the last 4 months since my wife asked for a divorce. I'm hesitant to post because it seemed I could glean many answers to my situation and didn't want to repeat a lot of what has already been said. However, there are some significant issues which I can't find that similar on this board. So here goes....

for some reason this struck me as too passive....why wait if you are hurting?



My sitch is married for 20 years, and have S16 and S19. S19 is a freshman in college and S16 is sophomore at a college prep boarding school.

do you live in a remote area so the younger son has to go away to school? Why isn't he at home?

I ask b/c that means she is alone at home that much more...and you are gone...dang,what a place to put someone and then have no one at home with them you cannot put a woman there and leave her alone so much...it's called a "hardship assignment" in the military for a reason.


I feel our relationship changed about 6 years ago when my wife went back to work. a year later she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She is 5 years cancer free this past fall, her treatment was a mastectomy initially with a preventive mastectomy a in Sept of 2010. This was not a reoccurrence but a preventative decision. Wife is an RN and I am a pilot for a major airline.


so did she have the reconstructive surgery for her breast removals? ANY menopausal symptoms? Such as?




W complaints have been I work too much, put my career ahead of the family, don't pay attention to her, wasn't there during the cancer treatments(radiation) because I was had to work.


were you there or not? Regardless of work issues, were you there for her or not? How much of it did you miss? If you were not there for her, who was?



Talked about living like roommates for the past couple of years and why didn't I want to do something about it.

ALARM BELLS ALARM BELLS.....DING DING

SHE FEELS VERY UNATTRACTIVE OR WORSE...AND YOU ARE LIVING "LIKE ROOMATES"....AND SHE TOLD YOU THIS....(that's her sending a red flare into the universe)

and what did you DO then, differently?


I was too hard on our oldest S, wasn't a very good father and role model for our sons.


what does that^^^ mean? Is it true? So, What's new NOW?


In summary, I've made every mistake you could make in a relationship it seems.

is this accurate, or mostly, or partly or only b/c you are wearing a hairshirt now and being a martyr??


Also, 15 years ago, I had a couple of incidents with drinking too much which led to inappropriate behavior of kissing and fondling. I did walk away from the situations before they went too far.


blah blah blah way too wordy!!! As far as SHE is concerned, you cheated. And I doubt she believes you didn't complete the act

and if she does, she isn't giving you a hero's award for "restraining yourself"...

the reason I said "blah blah too wordy" is b/c it's a bunch of long winded ways of saying a dirty secret you are ashamed of and you are making excuses (drank too much) and using euphemisms as you go along "Inappropriate behavior of kissing and fondling"...come on anch, you fooled around but caught yourself as the last lap was around the corner.

It's not the worst thing in the world but don't gloss over it or babble about it. Okay?



Three years after these incidents, I told my wife about them so she knows everything.


WHAT? Why did you tell her this? .... If it meant nothing then the only possible reason was b/c you wanted to unburden yourself of the guilt YOU felt. What a terrible reason...what a huge mistake.

If it DID mean something to you, then you mislead us in your previous description.

And the only other possible reason for telling her was b/c you thought it was going to come out anyway, so you can't get points for confessing b/c you wanted to put your spin on it.

There is no scenario in which you should have burdened her with this. None...

sorry but now I have to ask,

did you "fool around" WHILE she was getting radiation treatments or having her breasts removed,

or did you tell her all about it later on, DURING that?

See there's no good way to dance around all this. IT wounded her deeply and more deeply than you seem to realize.



We worked through it and it seemed she forgave me, but she has always been extremely distrustful of me, which is understandable.

Did you get counselling for it? See a minister or a priest or mc or someone to show your remorse and desire for change in the marriage? A way to regain her trust?

Did you just assume time not cheating, would make it alright? You would not be the first man to assume that but then again, there are a lot of divorces too...



I've never come close to anything since, made sure I was never in any type of situation that could be questioned. However she feels like I didn't do enough to help her with the trust issue and now says she should have left me back then and has never forgiven me for it.


is she right? I mean, other than "not doing it again" what did you do differently or to show her your regret? And one last time, I promise, why did you tell her about fooling around AND then expect your version to be believed?


Like many here, I've read every relationship book I can get my hands on; DB, 5 LL, 5 L of apology, If he only Knew, Tough Love, Hold me tight, etc. I've come to realize how insensitive I really was. I have made all the mistakes these books discuss. When my wife wanted to talk I withdrew because it felt like I was being criticized again. I'm to logical and stoic which meant I didn't communicate very well.


Maybe you were being criticized but maybe you needed to hear it. OR maybe she just felt her needs were not being met and you decided to react defensively which made you ignore the actual content of her words....a tragic mistake made all too often. The walls go up and the words are not heard...the sad hurt words...

I know when my h raises his voice I can no longer hear WHAT he says, and I don't. I leave the room or tune him out completely b/c I cannot be yelled at the way my mother was by my father. So my h has to use a careful tone with me. Plus it helps him to stay respectful of me. Which is KEY...



Of course I felt things we not great but I certainly didn't think we were headed for divorce. Last spring my wife took up skeet shooting and she felt it made realize how other couple interacted and we were not the same. Thing is, we got intimate a lot last spring, then in July we had an argument and from then there hasn't been any physical contact between us.


what was the argument about? I think It's important that you left it out.
How was the physical contact when you were having it? Was SHE happy with it?



She would get violently angry with me at everything, the F word is used all the time. It was directed at me mostly but even our sons got it sometimes. After the boys returned to school in August the relationship continued to deteriorate rapidly to asking for a divorce on Sept 20th.


sounds strange but I feel like sandi...we're missing a piece of the picture here...she got "violent"...about what? And how was she "violent" with the boys?

That same day I felt the best thing to do is give her some space so I stayed with some friends for the next thirty days. I wouldn't contact her, but she would always contact me.


interesting. Do you see that you chose the easiest path FOR YOU?

I'm not saying you are necessarily wrong but I hope you notice... it sure is convenient to you, that you "felt the best thing to do" was effectively ignore her....

this woman does NOT feel loved by you and hasn't for a long time.




The anger was and is always right there. Mid October I came back to the house even though she said she didn't want me to. While I was out of the house i would still come by when W was working to let the dogs out, do the laundry etc. I would also leave dinner of some type for her since she worked long hours.


Is her love language act of service and

OR IS IT QUALITY TIME TOGETHER???? The one thing you don't seem able or willing to give?



Since I have returned I have been cautiously trying the DB techniques.


such as? And with what results?

The trouble is, if I wasn't attentive enough to her before then ignoring her wasn't the thing to do it seemed. She would invite me to met her for lunch occasionally on her day off.


Did you go or not? How'd that go?


When I have tried to get a life it really makes her angry. For example, I wanted to go see the play "Grapes of Wrath". I invited her to go and bought a ticket for her. She said maybe, then said yes, then got extremely mad about me doing this without asking her first. She then refused to go so I went anyway. She got very angry that I went, accusing me of secretly meeting someone there. Her habit is to call me, say F You and hang up. This all occurred in November.


I've tried to do other different things such as go to a coffee shop to do some work on the computer.

why are you doing that?^^ Is that a GAL or work thing? What's the goal?


Even the made her very mad, the same verbal F bombs. I usually do all the cooking in our house, my wife has seemed to withdraw from any type of domestic endeavors. I do most of the laundry, the cleaning etc. Hasn't always been this way, but every since she went to work I have slowly taken on more and more of the chores.

b/c she is working and you are at home - which I assume means you are NOT working, correct??? Makes sense.....


The two years my son was here in jr high, I went to all the school functions, teacher meetings etc while W went to very few because of her work schedule.

when was her cancer? Did you miss things when you were physically absent from the home area? I am guessing yes.

I only point this out so that when you look at your scorecard (which I urge you to LOSE b/c you definitely have one)

know that SHE has her own scorecard and on hers, she is way ahead of you...just FYI

Lately I have made an effort to learn how to cook better so I made some nice dinners when W got home from work. She was complimentary(very) yet made it clear a couple of nice dinners weren't going to change her mind.


make light of those comments. All you were hoping for, after all, was changing her mind about your cooking...

(Have no expectations that gestures like this will consciously make her change her mind or heart, AND even if they did, she'd show you LAST...)



I even made a big deal out of decorating the Xmas tree. I made a xmas music CD and some cider then spent a Saturday trimming the tree and listening to the music with her. A few weeks before Christmas she started to let me come in her bedroom were we talk some, occasionlly I would scratch her back or rub her feet if she wanted. We have watched several movies together within the last month as well. We went to lunch two weeks ago and then went shopping together. She texted me later that evening with"Are we ok?". I asked her what she meant


next time say "I sure hope so" or 'I had fun with you today" so you are saying things that are upbeat and NOT showing any expectations...but don't ask her for more info. She's then being pressured.


and she said she had fun that day and hoped things would work out but that I shouldn't read anything into it.


accept that at face value and btw, it's positive...very...


She always makes it clear that she is going to divorce me and she is moving to Dallas. We currently live in Alaska and she has aged living here and can't wait to leave -


MOVE!...ALASKA'S NOT AN EASY PLACE TO LIVE... YOUR SON IS NOT LIVING WITH YOU EITHER...WHAT A SACRIFICE...AND SHE LIKES THE SUN...look at where she talks of living.




I am in management and this was a corporate move with the promise of moving us out this summer or next. She blames me for moving here as well. I ad just started with the company and they asked me to move here within the first year with the company. I actually wasn't crazy about it but she felt like it would be an adventure.


BOY OH BOY... DID YOU JUST HIT A NERVE WITH ME!!...

okay my h wanted out of his miserable job in Texas, which the rest of us LOVED...he loved Texas but not his job.

HE WANTED to move to Alaska (didn't YOU?)

and I was pregnant with our last baby and quitting my job anyhow. I felt sorry for h b/c of his job and felt like this would be good FOR HIM

but I had strong misgivings about Alaska as I love sunny weather, am affected by it, had a ton of friends and support in Texas as did the kids. WE knew no one in Alaska but h would meet people at his job.

It was FOR HIM that we moved and at the time, I thought it was the most loving thing I had ever done for him.

When we got there, he was very VERY busy, it got very dark and insanely cold, I was alone A LOT with a newborn....(Your w had it worse b/c at least a baby gives you purpose and our last baby was easy and happy)

but the folks off post were NOT friendy (I have lived in 9 states and by far the least friendly place was the interior of Alaska....they were almost rude and very cold to us, pardon the pun). We got NO invitations over like every other place we've lived.

No "welcome to the neighborhood" until we moved on post (finally) and met other military families. For a pregnant woman who had left all her friends to have a new baby, with her kids in school who missed their old home and a h who went AWOL on us soon after moving there, it was miserable.

You say she blames you for the move. Of course she does. Why else did you there? You say She "Consented" to it b/c you coerced her into it and didn't drag her onto the plane by the hair...

Do you honestly belive you put HER needs or the kids, first, when the move idea came up?

And Oh btw, I also said "it'll be an adventure"...b/c WHAT ELSE COULD I SAY??


In fact I wanted to keep our house and commute up here to AK but she didn't like the idea. Now she blames me because she didn't want to sell the house and I should have commuted like she states was her idea. She never misses an opportunity to let me know she is leaving for Dallas, she just hasn't set a date

just move already. A chunk of your problems will be solved if she get some damn sunlight her way and can learn to forgive you for putting her there in the first place and dumping the "inappropriate" stuff on her 3 years after the fact.

I apologize to my Alaskan friends who love it there. I love parts of it too but I so relatte to this woman who is in a place she does not feel is home but an alien land that she went to for her h,

only to have him deny that and mistreat her. Anc, it MIGHT go a long way with your w if you said "this is a hard place to live for ANY woman, esp in the winter so I know it was loving of you to agree to coming here for my career."

Anch, did it help your job or not? If so, let her know and thank her for that help!


My W has yet to file for divorce. She has retained a lawyer but wants to do this as cheaply as possible. We use her income to pay for college tuition and boarding school tuition. We make a very good combined income. Her intent is that I will pay for the boys tuition once the divorce is complete since I make 4 times her income and she will be "destitute". Of course this isn't the reality, if we divorce I can't pay the tuition on my income alone. She hasn't even given the documents to the lawyer yet to determine the financial division. AK is a no fault state, and it would be a fairly straight forward division of assets. W has actually stated that if I ever want to get back together wit her that this divorce better go smoothly.


well don't help her with it!

Tell her she's the love of your life and you want to stay married to her and you are trying your best.

But what would make her believe that marriage to you today

and from this day forward, would be better or different than before?

if you cannot answer that with some specifics, she won't return.

Demonstrate your changes to her...WHAT ARE THEY ANYHOW??

You need to be able to say "W, if I had it all to do over again, there are a lot of things I'd do differently" and leave it at that.

That shows insight and the desire to change and does not escalate.

but be ready to say HOW you'd do something differently like really only moving where SHE would be happy.

What flaws did she say you had that you are now working on?

I didn't see that in your posts.

Other facts about us, wife is 49 this Feb and I'm 46. She is going through menopause for about the last year or so. The anger and F bombs started last spring. She was sexually abused by her brother as a child. Brother claims it isn't true and her parents dismissed it as well. I know it is true because of how she told me(before we were married). I certainly didn't realize the implications of how this would have affected my wife as far as trust issues.


irrelevant to YOU now. That's for a shrink or an analyst to work on.

This site is solution based so focus on what YOU CAN CHANGE and do b/c all you control is you

too often abuse is used by the victim to stay stuck and by a mate to avoid being responsible for their own stuff. So don't even go there. She's working on it and that's enough. NOT YOUR job.



I have been talking to a DB counsoler since Sept. I'm working with Jody who is great. I have learned to have compassion for my wife and how she FEELS.

the DB coaches are great and specific.


And it has seemed that things were slowly getting better. We had a ski trip planned for a week after christmas with a family from Dallas that is my W best friend from college. W said they were uncomfortable with having me come so I stayed home. Leading up to the trip we told our two S about the her decision to divorce me. Although she wanted me to tell them that it was a mutual decision. I made it clear it wasn't what I wanted.

I asked my counsoler if I should get her a xmas gift and she felt it was a good idea. I got her a pearl bracelet. This was to replace a pearl bracelet I had given her in 2000 since the pearls where very worn. I told her in the card this was much like our relationship, can't fix it so lets start new. Well when I gave it to her she said it was beautiful and she kissed me on the cheek. That night they left for Utah and she gave me a hug(first hug since July). I thought things were again slowly getting better.


good stuff



This is where it gets beyond my ability to comprehend. One of the DB techniques is to get into shape which I had already started last April. So the day my wife left for Utah with my two S it was Xmas Eve and she sent me a picture of her and the boys that said Merry Christmas. So I decided to learn how to use the timer on my SLR and took a picture of me and our two dogs in front of our Christmas tree. Thought it would be nice. Since I've started working out I've lost 45 lbs while gaining a lot of muscle. It has been a great stress relief of course. But this is where it gets crazy. Sending that picture to my wife really mad her angry. She texted me continually Xmas eve and the Xmas day with the some pretty hurtful comments. Here is an example : "who did you send that photo to besides me? F you, you have this bracelet and shove it up you a**". "You are and always will be a liar, a cheat and a poor example of a man!' etc.


when she's feeling lonely - as she has for much of the marriage, her fears get to her and your confession fed into them. So she's getting wacky and we can hope that her c or t helps her with that.

she sure is not indifferent to you which, odd as it seems, is a good sign.







They went on like that all night. Of course I didn't respond. She assumed I had sent that picture out to my friends (or girls) with the intent of showing off how I looked. None of it was true but she wasn't going to believe me.

My question is this. How do I deal with this level of vitriol? Even my counselor was pretty shocked when I read her the texts.


what's the c say to do? Or the DB coach? And your sons?


I have spent the last 6 months learning how much I have been a part of my failed relationship. I know I need to make changes.


like what???



For the last week my wife has texted me every day with pictures but hasn't called. I know I can't expect anything, but I haven't even heard from my sons.

There is a lot more, but that is enough for this post. Would appreciate any help. I know Sandi2 was a WAW, is this level of anger normal. Both DB counselors I have talked to and my good friend all seem to think my wife really doesn't want a divorce. I don't know what to think after this last week.

Thanks,
Lost in Alaska

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well I think I've given you plenty to read for now.

There IS hope in your sitch.

Get her out of Alaska or get a realistic timeframe for a move and get her input into where you relocate EVEN IF YOU ARE DIVORCING

b/c maybe you'll want to sweep her off her feet later and you'd like to know where she'll be (ask the DB coach on that one)

((( )))