Picking up where we left off . . . I'm OnMyWay

[OnMyWay]

The first week, I stayed out of W's way, letting her get settled in and having some space to deal with her emotions. The end of the second week, I decided to put on my big-boy britches, make something of this marriage, and take her on a date - "Man Up" as it were. It was a good date, but we'd had drinks and ended up having sex at home after. BIG MISTAKE, even though I'd judged her as willing and thought she'd enjoyed it more than me, the next morning I awoke to Mrs. Hyde herself. Things calmed some and the next week, not learning my lesson or thinking I could "power through" her negativity and make a real connection like real man, I tried sex and she seemed receptive. Good morning, Mrs. Hyde, again. At this point, not only was our feeble attempt at a married sex life not working, but everything became wrong. She wasn't "feeling" anything and this wasn't "working" for her. All this time, however, she seemed to further entrench herself at home and forced her way into parenting decisions, for which I'd had most of the responsibility for over the past year. I was starting to feel like we'd made a mistake by not getting a D, yet I didn't feel she would ever consider leaving again. She blamed me for not including her or for going around her in parenting. She blamed me that our child had no discipline, that I was too soft and that it was my fault she always had to stand up and be the bad cop to D9 and her friends. I'd remind her we still had the divorce option, but that just added fuel to the fire as if I was using mind games on her to trick her into this marriage that she obviously had no intention of leaving. If I said something like, "Well, honestly, do you feel you are really trying?" or "You are the one who chose to come back," she'd just accuse me of falsehoods, trying TOO hard, and forcing the issue. She'd tell me I'd changed and wasn't the one she'd married; that I was too positive and it felt phony; that she resented my rosy outlook on life; that I wasn't living in reality.

During this period, we discussed counseling many times. Neither of us were particularly fond of the idea of going back into counseling. I for one didn't want to continue to pound away at our mistakes and continue to pour hot oil on the flames of our past, but rather wanted a way to move forward. I'd read on this board about Retrouvaille and offered it to her as an alternative, telling her I'd be willing to entertain the idea. I provided her with the information and left it alone. We ended up look at their web site together and requested more information. On the 23rd of March, we signed up for the April session, hoping for anything that would offer us a better direction.

With this new "hope" for us, she decided to "take her turn" to take me on a date, buying tickets to a wine tasting event - I was very worried. As tough as it was between us, the last thing we should be doing was drinking together. I was right. We ended up leaving early, with plans to go have food and more wine somewhere else. On the way, all manner of badness was brought up and we ended up going straight home, both saying bad things that closed the freezer door on the ice of our "new" marriage. At least we didn't try sex again.

This was all awful; five weeks in and we had already gone from neutral to pathetic. She missed the OM and blamed me for not being able to understand what this was all like for her. I complained that her R with him was inappropriate to begin with so my understanding was a mute point. Eventually, this new "life" began to take its toll on me and I felt the cracks in my new persona becoming chips. I felt myself crumbling. I knew this was all wrong, as I no longer felt like myself. I was loosing all the work I'd done on me and I was sad about it. I'd had enough, but I was pretty sure she would not be leaving - divorce was not going to be an option unless I was to be the one to go and there was no way that could happen. As my only option, I withdrew into myself.

The next three weeks, we hardly spoke to each other, living a weird coexistence; sleeping in the same bed, living in the same house, parenting the same kid, but living completely separate lives. It did allow me to regain a little composure and glue up some of my cracks. As our Retrouvaille weekend grew closer, the tension became palpable. I was trying to remain open to the idea of the weekend, but was worried W's idea was that this weekend would provide her with some sort of epiphany on how to fix this. Even our D9 seemed worried about us going away, not knowing if we come back together or separate. On the two month anniversary of her turbulent return, we entered the Retrouvaille program, which would force us to leave behind all connections to the outside world, focus on each other, learn to communicate in a much more functional and positive way. I knew it would be tough, but I had no idea it would be so emotionally draining, physically exhausting, and totally engrossing.

We are not religious, so we skipped the Catholic Mass at the end of the program and left. We were simply wiped out. While we both had positive things to say about the weekend and felt we both gained a lot of clarity, I could tell W hadn't discovered the epiphany she'd hoped for. It came out on the ride home and we pulled over to work through it. She was having a hard time with her feelings for the OM. After all our weekend training, she wasn't using the techniques we'd learned and I wasn't understanding what she was telling me - I thought she was ending our marriage. I ended up arguing back and bad mouthing the back-stabbing, former friend, home-wrecker OM and asked if he was still even available to her if she was deciding to go back to him because, "knowing him, he's already gone and banged 50 other women by now." Yup, that was the wrong thing say. I'm a real idiot sometimes. We were able to calm down, step back, and use some of our new tools to better understand each others feelings and helped each other understand better. She simply didn't believe I could ever understand the way she was feeling and she needed so badly for me to understand.

We drove home, got settled in, had dinner with our D9, and went to bed early. However, the power of the weekend and the disappointment of our argument kept us both up. Then, something happened and I once again gained clarity I'd lost since she moved back. The conversation rolled around to whether or not I'd had sex with other women while we were separated. She knew I'd dated, as she had given me permission to do so. I came clean that I'd had sex with one woman once, but it was my experiences with my former client (who I didn't have actual intercourse with) that had the most profound affect on me. Over the Retrouvaille weekend, we had discussed how I'd actually did want the divorce, which shocked her. She had always believed I was just using that as leverage to get her back. She originally knew of this woman's advances for me back when it first happened years ago. Now she was surprised that, not only had I had sex with someone, but that I really had been over her and had rediscovered this other woman with whom I shared an emotional connection. While I did not have a real relationship with her, I admitted freely how happy I had felt in my experiences with her, how loving she was, and how what I received from her was something I needed, as a man, that hadn't received from W in a very long time.

Out of all of this, I was able to explain that, while W needed me to understand how she felt about her feelings with regards to the OM, I was able to apply my experiences with this woman to understand far better than W ever imagined. Not only was I sympathetic, but I knew EXACTLY how she felt, how our marriage was no longer fulfilling, and how the excitement, beauty, and sexuality of someone else was a surrogate for what was lacking between us. I also pointed out how she herself had identified the timeline of leaving her pervious boyfriend for her friendship with me (which grew into our love), and ultimately leaving me for friendship with OM (which grew into an affair). That parallel shocked her. She was able to see the trend and, I believe, could conclude that it would most likely happen again. For me, it took much of the magic out of the OM, especially when I identified that, while I indeed have powerful feelings for my OW, I'm not going to drop my life to run off with her in some sort of schoolboy fantasy.

She was able to give back to me that I had said inappropriate things about OM and, in light of new information, may or may not change the way she sees things, but that she certainly has a lot to think about. I wasn't going to get in a tit-for-tat about OM, as our experiences are indeed different. She wondered my reasoning for telling her about all this now, if it were not to "level the playing field" with new information. I told her the impetus for telling her was that this OW is coming to town in June, that I have a professional relationship I must maintain, and that I wanted to be completely open about this stuff. She asked if I were considering leaving her for this OW. I am most certainly not. While it is undeniable I love the way she makes me feel, my true place is home with my family.

With the air finally clear, we both fell fast asleep.