Please explain the justification

[25yearsmlc]

Hey Pei,

good explanations for the majority of MLCers but when I thought about the potential events that happened in h's life, and there were many

I could say almost say the same about MY life and childhood, in nearly all ways.

If it helps someone as an LBSer to cope with things, to believe it's an MLC I say great. My one criteria that holds water to me even now, is that if other things they are doing are new and truly out of their character, not merely new hobbies but different in character, than before.

When we buy new clothes and change our hair, that's external stuff we do to visibly show we are GAL...and it's healthy.

But what I saw was that my h was a spendthrift before his MLC and for over 20 years he paid bills ahead of time and never let finance charges accrue on our credit cards, etc...so a year into the MLC he stopped paying ALL bills except the mortgage and forgot to tell me...so that was weird and out of character)...and NOT fun. There are other examples but that one was huge.

Here's my concern w/lengthy discourse on MLC (and I mean no offense b/c your post has great insight and is worth reposting on the MLC forum somewhere

but my feelings are mixed in w/my own personal regrets about choices that I made, which I now think were in error-based on the concept of MLC.

Saying the WAS is in MLC sometimes keeps the LBSer from doing their own personal work to improve

and sometimes attaching the label keeps their focus on the WAS instead of themselves, where it belongs.

And for ME, I spent so much time wondering if my h was in MLC or a WAS or what, and I just asked a lot of questions with NO GOOD answers...
and then I repeated them...a lot.

Like I could not take the exit ramp off the "WHY??? Freeway".

and I could/should have spent that time GAL much sooner, doing my 180a and creating a new beautiful life for me and the kids....

(which, ironically MIGHT have attracted h home earler?)

so there's a lot of that from my story that I see in others'. And it's as if, as long as we label the behavior,

we must not be responsible for any of the situation...NOT TRUE.

What I realized in finally seeing how I played a role in our marriages problems, was that

I was now empowered.

B/c if you are one of those rare near perfect spouses, and there are some but I wasn't one of them,

and you still get abandoned, that's a terrifyingly powerless place to be.

It's why I say the more you blame the WAS, the less power you have.


So I conceded and then embraced the role I played in the sense that it meant i could DO something to change ME and therefore change the dynamic.

Make sense?

Finally, I don't know if we have any empirical data that suggests MLCer have a better chance or reconciling than WASs, (therefore what difference does it make?)

The GAL and 180s are still the same no matter what...

I think there is anecdotal evidence that women who leave tend to return less often than men. It still supports that WASs only come back if they believe the marriage can be better and different than before. SO the LBSer has a job to do as far as demonstrating that possibility. IN THEM first, meaning the LBSer changes first...

Has that been your experience?

I've explored that elsewhere in depth. But I don't want to hijack the thread.


great post Pei.