Yes, working on stabilizing my emotions is something else I am really trying to do. I'm trying to be gentle with myself about it and give myself time but seems to be getting worse rather than better.
I accept that my only chance to save my marriage is by going dark.
Even then, however, I feel there really isn't anything in my favour that would help me save my marriage.
We live 2500 miles apart, H sees OW everyday H has indicated is has NO interest in reconciling and is 'truly happy' in his new life (which I can see that he probably is)
During our marriage I never gave myself fully to my husband. I was thoughtless, self-protectionist, set him unrealistic standards he couldn't achieve, and took him for granted. It hasn't been a particularly nice thing to find out or acknowledge about myself, but I completely accept it is true.
It has taken losing my H to make me take my blinders off, realise how much I love, care and appreciate him, to see how I've undermined his feelings (and ego), and to see how I've been steadily contributing to the break-down of our marriage. Another not nice thing to accept and acknowledge about yourself (and one of the reasons why I am perhaps somewhat defensive and more understanding/accepting of H's A).
I am starting to understand that, although I have been saying to him, I know there are no guarantees that things will work out, but I would like us to try to give our marriage another year, another 6 months, even another 6 weeks, to him it seems like I'm asking for an absolute and asking him to give up the OW, and be forever in marriage that he is certain is beyond repair and that could never be happy or healthy. From his perspective he probably feels like he gave me a decade to become the kind of W he wanted and needed and now it's "too little, too late" for him to give me any further consideration
From his perspective, I'm asking him to give up his current happiness for something that has 'not worked' for many years. If the situations were reversed I may have responded the same way he has.
His needs are now being met not just by the OW but also by a new city and job he loves.
I feel I have to acknowledge that there is no way I can compete--I really don't stand a chance and it's probably kinder (and less selfish) to all involved if accept he has found a new, happy life that doesn't include me.
Whether it's the ideal of marriage or whether it's him I've been struggling to fight for has been something I've been asking myself (particularly when all of this first began). It is also something H has mentioned previously, and to his mind at least, he thinks that, while I have grown to care/love him, it is the ideal of the marriage I am afraid of losing. One of my saddest realisations and discoveries is that it IS HIM, not just the ideal of our (or any) marriage. It has always been him. And part of me just can't bear to just let him go...
