My Sitch/any better ideas than going dark?

[Broken74]

Mach1,

For compare/contrast/reference purposes sure I think it matters... Two wrongs don't make a right...

I am looking for your primary threads to read but I see you have 278 pages of posts. Could I ask you to link your primaries here possibly?

And yes, please do enlighten me, you were married twice as well? I would like to know your synopsis if you don't mind sharing.

I know that my actions pushed her into the arms of another man, I don't dispute that. HOWEVER, the way the she went into that relationship and the way that she handled effectively after the point she decided she was "done" without making that clear to me, was totally inappropriate.

I don't think any reasonable person could come to a different conclusion if they understand my sitch from start to finish, honestly.

Thank you again for your opinion, it is greatly appreciated.

[Oneeleven]

Broken, you're most welcome for the feedback.

I certainly hope you don't think I was telling you how I think you should feel, or anything like that.

I just wanted to warn you that this 'done feeling' that is fueled by a really $hitty occurrence may not entirely stick.

But I am glad for you that you feel 'clearer' on where you stand on your own sitch.

That can be very helpful in itself!

Signed,
The queen of the wafflers! LOL

[MrBond]

Just my .02

"I know that my actions pushed her into the arms of another man, I don't dispute that. HOWEVER, the way the she went into that relationship and the way that she handled effectively after the point she decided she was "done" without making that clear to me, was totally inappropriate."

She probably did try to tell you what was going on but you didn't want to listen. Be honest now, what would she have had to do before in order to get you to listen. You probably would have just dismissed her like the rest of the LBS did. It's natural because the LBS doesn't even imagine D as being an option. So you take their feelings for granted.

Just MHO.

[Broken74]

Thanks Mr.Bond,

I took her hint as when she asked me for some time to think, when I left the house under the guise of our both working on our relationship, when I left to do the right thing by her and the kids. Inherent problem is, she was already frolicking with the OM over a month prior to this happening. I have documentation of their colluding on strategies to keep me out of our house 100% in my name. So she basically "tricked" me out of the house I built for our family to stabilize her living arrangement and get me out of the way so she could get her affair on without my meddling. Nice right?

So I can't say I took her feelings for granted, I was doing the right thing, had already changed my behaviors, and was full steam wanting to work on my marriage. Problem is, she was lying through her teeth and playing me for a fool in the process.

I can't say that I'm a victim here, more like a dumba$$...

I greatly appreciate your feedback and taking the time to write it here. Thank you

[25yearsmlc]

Mach1,

For compare/contrast/reference purposes sure I think it matters... Two wrongs don't make a right...

I am looking for your primary threads to read but I see you have 278 pages of posts. Could I ask you to link your primaries here possibly?

And yes, please do enlighten me, you were married twice as well? I would like to know your synopsis if you don't mind sharing.

I know that my actions pushed her into the arms of another man, I don't dispute that. HOWEVER, the way the she went into that relationship and the way that she handled effectively after the point she decided she was "done" without making that clear to me, was totally inappropriate.

I don't think any reasonable person could come to a different conclusion if they understand my sitch from start to finish, honestly.

Thank you again for your opinion, it is greatly appreciated.

NONE of this^^^ matters at all these days...

Truly the only relevant question NOW is, what are YOU going to do

to show your wife that marriage to you now and from this day forward,

can be better/different?

IF she doesn't believe things can improve or that you have changed, it won't happen.


Nothing about who is assigned more blame helps you at all, except owning ALL of your issues and staying in your sandbox. Don't get into hers.

You have your own work to do and even now you are straying to look over into her sandbox to critisize her. Don't bother.

Focus on YOUR OWN WORK b/c you are all you control.

Good luck

[Broken74]

Thanks 25mlc,

Thanks for the kick in the pants, I greatly appreciate your feedback :-). I agree that none of the past matters these days, especially to her. To me however, I have to keep in mind, what her future behaviors could be, based on her behaviors of the past, just like she is doing with me. I have just as big a decision to make in the matter as she does, to determine what's best for me in the long run, since she decided to bounce. She certainly has no concern for what I'm doing.

As for now I'm totally detaching. How I will be able to stop dwelling on the past during this process remains to be seen. My mindset is that they no longer exist and I am moving on with my life, as a single man. So she's not really going to have the opporunity to see anything that I'm doing or changing, and that's fine by me. Maybe she will reach out to me or maybe she won't. I can honestly for the first time say I don't care at this point. And if she said she want's a divorce in August today I would say I am in full agreement with her.

So I guess I'm in a good spot in that I really don't care anymore. I'm going to be the best man I can be for me and prepare myself for any future R opportunity that may present themselves. In the meantime she can go sandwich the OM and his brother if he has one for all I care, honestly lol.

I finally feel like I am where I need to be. If she starts coming back to me one way or the other I will cross that bridge if I come to it, in the meantime I honestly don't care if she does or not.

I'm traveling the next two weekends for pleasure and am in the process of booking golf trips with my boys. GAL has always been my speciality, and it's on like a pot of neck bones...

Thanks again for your feedback it's greatly appreciated!

[MrBond]

Prior to the OM I mean. What issues did the two of you have that weren't changed? I know how hard it is to believe that the OM is the problem. My W had an A with her boss, twice her senior. I get that feeling. But once the anger goes away, you're still left alone and bitter.

So what issues came up before that happened? 25yrsmlc is right. What do you intend to do from this point is going to set the tone for how your future and your W's will be.

[25yearsmlc]

Broken,

you seem to be running out of options so I went over your earlier post. This may feel like a 2 x 4 but it's intended to shake up your perspective and viewpoint a lot.

You are still making this about how wrong she is for not giving you another chance and that won't get you anywhere. And for the record, what do you mean when you say you have accepted responsibility for your part of the problems?

The more you condemn her actions, the less you sound like someone working on himself to improve...

Hi folks,

First time post here, I have read many of your stories and my heart goes out to you. I have Divorce Busting and Divorce Remedy and am working my way through both of them. My drama has been going on since before August 2011, as with many I have been doing all the wrong things, especially during the holidays looking back, so I am going black today to try and get some type of different response from my wife.

So a little history. This is my second marriage, I met her the same month my first divorce was finalized which probably was an issue in and of itself. Beautiful, smart, caring, loving young woman. She also was bankrupt due to issues in her first marriage, and has three children by two different men, father of the first is incarcerated for shooting someone in the back during a robbery attempt. Her home life growing up was not stable at all. She is 30 and her children are 16, 11, and 7. I never got the details of the entire story but she said she was raped but decided to keep the first child. The second and third child were fathered by someone who was effectively a deadbeat dad and left her bankrupt. So she had one child at 14, a second child at 19, and the third at 23. She also had an abortion at some point, I think after the third child on the realization that they could not handle a fourth child and then had her tubes tied. In addition to this her mother has been married I think 6 times in total. So all in all, she has had much adversity in her life. She is very smart, beautiful, is very hardworking and very successful in her career, and is a salt of the earth woman which is why I married her.

I guess there is a valid reason for all this info ^^^ but ito me, it also smells a bit like you want an explanation of this event that places responsibility on her or her past. I am not sure how useful all this is b/c

DBing is a solution based approach, NOT focussed on the how and why you got here but how can you help your situation now.


Then there is me, 37, no kids, successful corporate guy with my own bag of issues. Some being my selfishness and infidelity in my first marriage, my cheating on my second wife while we were dating (I never even looked at another woman during our marriage however). I also have significant self esteem issues that led to a womanizing streak between the marriages that’s really a long story for another forum.


hmm ^^^ this is a rather summary explanation of some character flaws that would give any woman pause. IT also sounds like pretty selfish behavior. I DO NOT mean to bash you, but I want you to look at how you see YOUR flaws as more "easily remedied" or explained, than when the shoe is on the other foot.

IN short, you must learn empathy for HER point of view or you'll get nowhere. IT's a big quality to have and a huge one to lack
.

We met in February of 2009 and got married in May of 2010. I asked her to marry me because I obviously wanted her to be my wife, and to prove to her that I was done messing with any other women.


you married her to prove you were going to be faithful?

We got engaged in December 2009, I moved in with her at this time and our relationship was very good during this time in my opinion (probably mainly because I wasn’t going out at all and staying with her 100% of the time). She had self esteem issues with her body based on my prior actions and some things I had said, so I went to bat with 22k of plastic surgery for her just prior to our getting married in May.


Wow...ALARMS RINGING....!!!!

So you DID some things (but you won't say what) and you SAID some remarks (also vague on those) that affected her self esteem about her body image--and instead of stopping that destructive behavior (and finding out why you would say such cruel things and sabotage her self image)

YOUR SOLUTION was to get her plastic surgery?? That only confirms that she had a defect or problem that needed repair....it feeds right into a low self esteem.

I cannot imagine that helped HER self esteem or your r....

even now you seem to think you were kind or generous to do it. You skim over the actions you did and you don't tell us the type of remarks you made but you do tell us the cost/price of the surgery "you gave" her... All this, and quoting the actual cost/price strikes me as odd.


I also helped her work out selling her house to a family member which allowed her to climb out of bankruptcy, and bought us a house in April of 2010, to allow her to get sole custody of her kids as well as give them their own rooms for the first time. Bought her a new car for her birthday in August of 2010 which was also a first. Her love language was receiving gifts so I definitely have done my part in this regard.


So she was not working through all of this time^^^? Why do you think that her love language is gifts? And all this discussion of the THINGS you gave her ---is it helping you to understand the marriage problems?

Or is it more about making yourself feel better?

Up to this point I probably sound like a dream come true but that is certainly not the case.

wow...sorry but, not to me.

I had an alcohol problem, didn’t drink a lot but when I did I would get plowed and was verbally abusive toward her on a number of occasions. In all honesty I don’t know many of the things I said to her, but I feel that many of them were brought on by the financial pressures that existed since I was burdened by all our financial obligations.

Were you drinking when you made the comments about her body that caused her to get extensive plastic surgery? You are, again, letting yourself off the hook for your negative traits as if they are minor and excusable.

Sounds to me pretty simple--you gave her presents but You were also often mean to her. Your unkindness did serious damage to the marriage and your r's with the kids.

The financial obligations were your choice too....don't do favors if you're going to resent the person later and mistreat them, as it is sooo not worth it.


She was certainly contributing significantly to the household, but all of the credit was in my name and there was no support being provided for the children except she an I.

So you were financial partners and she earned money? Why continue on in there about her ex's not paying and how you were more or less a victim in the situation?

You are portraying yourself as a victim. Do you see how this point of view does NOT HELP YOU?


I also had a hard time with the transition to the role of stepfather. I was always nice to the kids and gave them plenty of things, but I was not as generous with my time and attention and affection toward them as I should have been and I very much regret that.

sounds like how you were to your w.

You gave them or her THINGS, but your behavior was not loving or kind and you did not give them time and attention, so to me it's the same treatment really. I would guess one of her love languages is quality time together b/c you stated that you got along well when you were together and engaged...

you seem to think you were with her too much but my guess is she wanted that (and you didn't??)




So there were a number of altercations

as a L, that^^ word conjures up some pretty dramatic images to me. IF you are using the word correctly

then the "altercations" were all traumatic for HER and her children. You need to See that.

we had in 2011, and I will take responsibility for most of those based on my verbal abuse after drinking. We ended up physically separating in September 2011 (I took on all the marital debt including the remainder of her surgical expenses)

I don't know about your debt issues, but seriously, the surgery? To still mention it as if it was a favor to her, and yet a burden to you, is off putting to me. Sorry.

Not to mention how you glossed over your mistreatment of her again.


at which point I stopped drinking and was making every effort to put 100% into trying to reconcile our situation.


so when you realized you were losing her, you chose to change? Not so unusual here.

The problem was, that my wife had already started an online relationship with another man, and coereced me into leaving the home that I built for us on the guise of “giving us some time”



What? now you were "coerced"? You were fighting and you say you were abusive...and drinking too much. Seriously man, you have to stop blaming her and letting yourself off the hook so much ---or YOU will not change ---and you'll be here again after your next r fails.

while she was talking to this other man for hours on end and planning weekend getaways with him. She lied about this when I presented the fact that she started talking a blocked number at all hours of the night the night that I left our marital home.


Given your history, how do you truly think you would have reacted to her confessing it?

Why would SHE expect anything but more anger from you? Do you see how she felt now? You don't have to agree, but you do have to understand another point of view...

This really becomes a hair splitting matter of timing I guess, because our last altercation was while she was on a business trip to Minnesota, at which point she says that was the breaking point of our marriage. This was never exactly clear to me.

the exact timing is not important...and I think you see that now.


We continued to see each other at times, I spent a number of nights over at the house, and on October 9th had two of my stepchildren and took them to a band competition that my stepson was in. That night I came back to my house and came in because I brought them dinner back, and found a gmail account with all of the communications, naked pictures back and forth etc proving her dealings with this other man. I contacted this man and told him to leave my wife alone and confronted her with this information. I told her we could get past this and that I forgave her and wanted to work on our marriage. In response she filed a 50B restraining order against me on the basis of she was fearful for her and her childrens safety when I had never laid a hand on nor threatened anyone. She put this order in place because I busted up her affair and her affair partner dumped her at this point supposedly.

so you don't think your temper or negative behavior had anything to do with the restraining order? AND You were perfectly calm throughout the communications with her

AND WITH OM? Why do you say the reason she asked for the order (Which the court granted) was b/c you "busted up her affair"? Did SHE SAY THAT?


Despite the 50B being in place we continued to communicate at times. She was no longer comfortable living in our house because it was in my name, so she persued another rental property. I provided her funds to get into this rental property and she swore she was no longer corresponding with the prior affair partner. Much to my surprise this was not the case, and when I saw a Mercedes in front of her new house one Sunday morning without thinking I just knocked and walked in because I wanted to meet the individual who was interfering with my attempts to reconcile my marriage. My wife called the cops and I spent the night in jail for violating the 50B restraining order. She swears up and down and I believe that she is not romantically involved with this other man.

...what changes were YOU making in yourself to help reconcile the marriage?

Ironically we continued to communicate, and ended up spending time together over Christmas and New Years even having sex a couple of times. I continued my gift giving trying to give her and the children the best Christmas possible, culminating in helping her get into a BMW that she had always wanted. She is paying for the car I just helped her with the financing.

how about the verbal abuse? Did that stop? And the drinking? And how were your interactions w/her kids other than you spending money on them?

To me it seems your love language is giving gifts, but that does not mean it's the recipients love language. And for sure as a parent, I can assure you the kids want time and attention more than anything else...fyi

After new years I finished the arrangements for renting the marital home and have moved about 30 minutes away from her. We really haven’t seen each other significantly since new years.

Her statements continue to be that “I can’t force the walls down to let you back in”. By all accounts from her the marriage is over and there is no chance of our reconciling.

In my heart I know that she still loves me. I take ownership of the things that I did to hurt her, but when you take a sum total of our relationship the good far outweighs the bad. I have stopped drinking, strengthened my relationship with God, and made many other changes but none of these things had helped our situation at all.


what are your 180s? And what SPECIFIC behaviors have you changed? The more specific you are, the more believable the changes...

also consistent change + sufficient time = change she can believe in.

IMO, I'd Stop the gifts and work on the behaviors.

Seems you have expectations that attach with the gift giving, so it smacks of "buying love" and that backfires.


Our last positive communication was January 3rd, she said “Just want to say thank you for everything you’ve done for me and the kids over the holidays. You always take good care of me and I appreciate it. I need some time alone though, I’m not seeing or talking to anybody. I’m just spending time alone. I need some time to get myself and life together. I want you to be happy though, so I encourage you to date other people.”

Then I sent her this “Love is a cycle. When you love, you get hurt, when you get hurt, you hate. When you hate, you try to forget, when you try to forget, you start missing. And when you start missing, you’ll eventually fall in love again”.

To which she responded: “You need to learn to let me miss you”.

So in short, I really screwed up during the holidays. I should have “went dark” during that time as I still met her wants and needs during that time while still being treated like a doormat.


are you saying YOU were treated like a doormat? How so? She's been very clear with you that you need to back off so she CAN miss you but you don't seem to hear that.

And how can you say you met her wants and needs? If you had, you would be together now. I really don't get your view of this.



So I am going dark as of today. The 50B order expires on 2/13. I had extravagant plans for Valentines day but am going to scrap all of those. My only hope is that that day with no contact from me will be a really significant shock to her system. By her own admission I have always made her dreams come true. I can’t figure out to make her realize that I have a changed heart and want to do nothing but be happy with her and our family.


I'll read the rest of your thread but seems to me you have been missing the boat on what she needs vs what you want to give.

And the idea that you were a perfect mate before, doesn't help your cause. It shows lack of insight.

Dig a lot deeper in you and you may get somewhere.

Any thoughts or better ideas than going dark at this point? I feel like the last resort technique is my only hope. Thanks in advance for any feedback you can provide, God Bless you all. :-)

I'd start behaving differently if given the chance-- (& frankly, even if you aren't given the chance. ) This is your 3rd m.

[25yearsmlc]

Thanks again Kaffe,

And to feedback on some of your other points, I have definitely found that patience is going to have to be a key part of this entire exercise----. it expires in February, I honestly felt that some time together during the holidays would help us out. I think it did given the fact we were intimate on multiple occasions and also given what she said during the holidays. And my saying the 50B order is a joke probably isn’t the best way to put it. I guess the way I look at it is, I had my stepkids the night before/morning she issued the 50B. I didn’t threaten her or say anything remotely hostile to her after finding out about the affair. I said that we could work through this, that I forgave her and please find it in her heart to stop the behavior and allow us to work on our marriage.


based on numerous comments you make elsewhere, its clear you have Not forgiven her. Words are meaningless, actions are all that matters. Don't keep bringing OM up.

If you know you won't get past it without an "apology" from her, when she probably feels you pushed her into his arms in the first place,

why bother with all this effort? Without you letting go of OM and moving forward this is all fruitless.



She---- I agree with your opinion that I need to respect the opinion of my wife, but

when I see the word "BUT" after a concession, it negates it. It counters it. So there is no concession or agreement by you. = So you are NOT respecting her opinion and reading the whole paragraph proves it. You think she's dead wrong to have said she feared you and you are not interested in exploring whether that is true AND if so why it might be.


she and I both know she has never had any reason to be fearful of me, perhaps of my mouth on occasion, but never by me physically. She even went to DA to try to get the charges of my violating the order dropped, but unfortunately the DA wouldn’t budge on the charges. Everything will be dropped after I complete these classes and the 1 year anniversary of the charges comes around (December 2012).

So I actually had class today and we had some worthwhile dialogue, there is no question that this class is going to help me out. One of the things we spoke about was owning up to your actions and apologizing, which I have done with her many times over and have been doing for many months. In spite of all of my apologies and nice things I have done for her and her kids, she has never provided an ioto of remorse for her elicit affair. It’s going to be hard for me to find closure to this one way or the other until she apologizes I think.

this^^^ is you keeping score. Scorekeeping ends many many marriages.

You tend to inflate your "nice things" beyond what she sees. I do not believe gifts mean as much to her as you believe they do but it's clearly how YOU express your love. Stop assuming it's how she receives it.


And in truth if you realized she has her own scorecard and on that card, YOU are not ahead, you'd see how important it is to stop measuring.

The mean comments or what you describe as "verbal abuse" does much more damage than you seem aware of. To me, it's the biggest reason for you being here.

You don't measure things with the same "barometer" so you will never see things identically OR agree on the marital history.

I also struggled w/that concept b/c I had a long list of "grievances" w/my h that I felt were points on my side. I wanted him to agree with my version of our past.

That doesn't happen when witnesses see the same car accident, let alone when emotions are running high and it's a marital history. AND

It just kept me from finding solutions and changes to make in me.



I also think that she likely has a lot of pent up guilt and feels bad about everything that she has put me through over the last 5 months, and I think that is probably hurting our relationship.

this is major mind reading here^^^^ AND imo, projecting your feelings onto her.

Dig way deeper into You.


I am hopeful that she will come to grips with all of that, understand that I have already forgiven her, and just want the chance for us to at least consider starting over at some point.


but you have not forgiven her. See your above comment about not having closure unless she shows remorse and apologizes...

how did you show remorse w/your previous wives when you hurt or betrayed them? Are you expecting more from her than you gave your previous w's?

As far as remorse I have told her the way I handled the entire situation was wrong. Even though her elicit affair was wrong, it was wrong for me to step and try to control the situation.


so what is the score now? See how useless this frame of reference is?


That sounds extremely stupid for me to say as any man in his right mind is going to fight for his wife and his marriage if he truly loves her, which was what I did. This other man was a new cancer to my attempts at reconcile and I wanted it cut out, and I was eventually successful. But given where we are now and what she has said, I honestly think if I would have let it run it’s course, she would have wanted me to come back to our marital home a long time ago. Now she’s in another house and I have the marital home on the rental market praying for a tenant… IF she will ever open her heart again, I think we will be in a good place to try and work on things, hopefully together.


I hope she does. I hope that when she looks your way, you will have done the work YOU need to do on you, so you are truly ready to be in the healthy marriage you want.


On your other point, I know she won’t use the 50B as leverage, as although she may be manipulative she is not that cold. The things I did over the holidays were out of the goodness of my heart, she never asked for anything at all, suggested I didn’t get them gifts etc.

based on the score keeping comments (about how nice you have been and how giving, yet w/o payback) I feel as if you do attach expectations to the gifts. That won't help you or the cause.


The fact of the matter is their Christmas was more enjoyable which was why I did what I did. We would probably be talking now if I did have my minor case of diarrhea of the mouth last week. So in short, as far as the 50B is concerned, it expires the day before Valentines. I have no intention of communicating with her before then, nor on Valentines day for that matter to try and prove the point that I am moving on with my life. It sounds as if you think the children are ours when they are all three her children, I hope that I again get the opportunity to be a better stepfather to them, but the 50B kind of took that out of play for now, although I did take them to a hoops game a couple of weeks ago. -- I love and miss them very much as well.

I am done pursuing, I am done giving gifts, I am done doing anything except abiding by the 37 rules and working my LRT. I am looking forward to her reaction when she contacts me and I don’t respond.

????

You mention what a better future means to me and what I said holds true, I think with each passing day that is going to be subject to change. On Mondays when I have to leave work early, drive an hour round trip and sit in a domestic violence class for an hour and half, my opinion may lean toward “after all I have done for her, and I look at what she has done for me, why in my right mind would I want to reconcile”.

I am amazed that you are still NOT owning any of this for real. If I were in a domestic violence class for that long, I'd sure as heck ask myself what I DID to get myself there.

The blame game is preventing growth and progress in you.


But the bottom line is that I love the woman with all of my heart. That is why I started fighting in the first place. My life would be exponentially easier if I didn’t, if we reconcile I will be the one helping raise two other people’s children through their teenage years, and I will be the one helping put them through college, and helping them though any of lifes struggles. I would do this because I love them and her, they have got a raw deal in life through no fault of their own, and I hate that is the case. When I write about them it sounds negative and I am not trying to sound that way.


yes it sounds negative, as if you see yourself as a martyr and excellent or self proclaimed "dream h"....

So I'm tempted as a mother to say, "don't bother 'rescuing' my kids if it's such a big drag on your great life"...and that is simply my gut reaction speaking but it might be hers too.


The fact of the matter is that I have options, one to be the husband, stepfather, spiritual leader and family man that I know that I can be, and roll with the pluses and minus that ride with that. Alternatively I can be a successful 38 year old single guy who is pretty damaged that has some bruises and cuts to heal, but that really would not have too many cares in the world and could jump a plane to tahiti at a moments notice. . I have never had issues finding female companionship so that isn’t a point of concern.


Finding women isn't your problem, keeping them is.


I am still reeling from the betrayal of being cheated on, that is something that has never happened to me, to my knowledge anyway prior to this incident.

Then you need to work on THIS^^^ issue and learn to let it go (did your first wives let it go? ) Anyhow if you hold onto this "betrayal" much longer - every piece of "effort" is wasted b/c w/o letting this go

you won't reconcile and last. And you will just prolong this. Lose the scorecard and let the A go..

Be a man only a fool would leave.

At this point I am not ready to give up and my goal is to hopefully eventually be able to start working with my wife on our relationship, and see where it leads. I have hope but no expectations, as given her behavior it would be stuipid to have any expectations at all.
---
Thanks again Kaffe you are the best! I have been following your posts and you always have great advice. It also sounds like your sitch is in a relatively stable place I hope that continues and you are able to build upon that. Thanks again for your help!

[Broken74]

25yearsmlc,

From the bottom of my heart I want to thank you for all the time you invested in reviewing my sitch and responding with your feedback, I know it was time consuming and it means a lot to me. You have given me a lot to think about and really put things in a perspective that I have not thought about. It is going to take me some time to absorb this and be able to formulate a response, because I think you have opened my eyes to a number of things. I'm still on the no contact train and am maintaining that.

Thanks again for your time and thoughtful response, I will hopefully have my reply completed by tomorrow. Thanks again for your help!!! :-)