O.k., here is my story in the briefest way possible… H and I got married at 19. We had our first son a little over a year later, 2 more to follow in the next 6 years. We moved around quite a bit as he was in the military. Both of us have always just had one foot in the marriage. I know that my ambivalence was from a lack of security and feeling loved. So, I did the completely WRONG thing- I made myself as unlovable as possible (whiny, needy, dependant), and wondered why he didn’t respect me. But still we plodded on… problems here and there, but for the most part I think we got along better than most people we knew! Shortly before our 10th anniversary, I found out he had an OW for about a year. I was totally clueless to this! Honestly, he was always home!!! He told me about it when I expressed extreme unhappiness with our R. He said it was over, that he needed to come clean. I spent the next few months being harassed by this OW (letters, copies of phone receipts, etc.) I felt like he fed me to the wolves on that one- he was convinced she couldn’t have done such a thing…I felt hung out to dry. His reason for the A? He felt that I was “too good for him, and he wanted someone more on his level.” (?????) We went to counseling, but moved across country after a few sessions. I was not ready for counseling anyway. I have a very sharp tongue, and as far as I was concerned, I was there to show off my verbal skills and nothing else. What a waste. Things were o.k. for the next few years. If you ask me, that is! According to H, I verbally abused him to no end for his “indiscretion.” He took it, because he felt as though he deserved it, but inside he was boiling mad. Looking back, I know that when I felt insecure I brought it up, hoping to hear some words of security. When that didn’t happen, I started a fight, knowing we would make up afterwards and I would get what I needed that way. After a while, this stopped working. H just totally withdrew from me. I’m sure I stepped up my efforts- you know, “more of the same.” Finally, I think I just withdrew too.
Enter fun and exciting friend of the family. Suddenly my life meant something! (I’m being sarcastic- I may have felt this then, but see it for what it really was now). He couldn’t get enough of what I had to say. And, he said all of the things I wanted to hear. Suddenly, I was funny, and smart, and beautiful! This was so much easier than actually doing the work to make myself that way! So, I started a PA. It is the biggest regret of my life. I don’t even know why I went through with it. I think I just wanted to see if things were different with someone who thought so highly of me! (They weren’t). Once in this mess, I had a hard time extracting myself from it. It had dawned on me that it was no one else’s job to make me feel good but mine! Last Jan. I got every self-help book our library had and worked on making me better. I stopped the PA, but stupidly kept up occasional talks with the OM. Of course, H found out. This happened just this past March.
Immediately, H told me to get out, he wanted a D. I did everything wrong- cried, begged, pleaded…. He wouldn’t budge. He said that he finally felt good about us (due to the MASSIVE changes I had made), but was seeing that anything I did was out of guilt, not out of wanting our R to work. (NOT TRUE!) Then, one day he said he’d like to give us a shot. He wouldn’t guarantee anything, but he wanted to work on “us.” Well, I guess we got busy with our lives and just didn’t do the work.
In Aug., H came to me and said he couldn’t do this, he wanted a D. Once again, the tears started. This turned him off totally. He was disgusted with me, told me to get strong because I would need to be. He said that he didn’t love me, doubts that he ever did in the right way, and knew what it was I wanted, but just never felt like giving it to me. Yet, he stuck around for 2 months! On Halloween night (for weeks he kept saying he was leaving, yet never did), I looked into his e-mail and found a letter from a co-worker that was not your typical co-worker correspondence. I packed his suitcase for him, and asked him to leave. Even this took 2 more days! In this time we had some great conversations- he even remarked that he had never felt like we were capable of this. Much to the agony of our 3 sons (17, 14, 11), he finally left. One week passed with him semi-away- I say this because just about every day consisted of a visit to the boys or a call. He even asked me to set up an IM account so we could correspond. 8 days after he left we went to dinner. I asked it he would ever be coming home. He said, “probably not.” The next afternoon he called and asked to come home. He said “no guarantees, but he would try.”
So, here we are now. We started counseling in Nov. Not real sure about this yet. My counselor assured me that she read the DB books and believed in them. I don’t see it this way. I am thinking of chatting about this at my next app’t. The bad thing is that H has realized that he has lots of “issues” to deal with, and he likes this C! He has many family problems, and he feels like he is ready to deal with them. In fact, he said he will not work on us until he gets thru that. So, according to him, our R is “on hold” for now.
Where I stand: Who knows??? He still hasn’t said he loves me in months. He took off his ring back then and it is still off. He says the co-worked was just a friend who was listening to what he needed to say. He has since promised to keep all personal talk between us and the C.
Positives: He started sleeping in our bed after 2 weeks on the couch after returning home in Nov. We ML occasionally. He has, in the last week, started calling me “baby” again. He has started doing little affectionate things. He spoke to me yesterday about how he is going to re-do the office in our home. He came to me last week and said that he knew that my changes were real, not just a ploy, and it was important that he tell me that. He also added that he didn’t want it to turn into a R talk, that was all he had to say. (And he’s not even a Dber!!!)
We had dinner together the other night, and he once again said that there were no guarantees. He just wanted to work on being friends right now.
I know that I have screwed up, (we both have), but I love this man more than anything. He may sound like a jerk on paper, but he’s honestly the best guy and best dad I have ever met. My heart is aching because we have had such a wonderful last two weeks….then, this morning, he left for work without saying a word. Haven’t heard from him since. Man, I’m so confused!
