I've your read post and have been keeping up with it and all I can do is shake my head in disbelief at what I read. You actually caused me to come out of retirement.
The reason people are getting somewhat annoyed is because you don't do backslides. You do Olympic high jumps in the wrong direction and then follow it up with a 3000M run just for good measure.
If i have to quote and comment on the things that i think you are doing that is hurting you instead of helping you I would be here till next week so I will skip all that.
First let me tell you that NO ONE and I mean NO ONE can claim that they did not make mistakes. Even the famous 25 made mistakes along with J3B and everyone in between. When you react and think emotionally you are bound to do things that are counterproductive to what you want to accomplish. That being said.... the question then becomes not how many mistakes you made but how you adjusted to them.
You have gotten some patient and decent advice. I read you have a learning disability and sometimes it takes you several reads before you get it. Well, if that is the case then I suggest you read the post you find helpful many times over.
People get DB confused I think with some magic potion that is a cure all. They imagine they can come on this forum get some advice and then go and execute it with huge success. Naturally they become discouraged when they don't see any results. Sometimes they see what appears like positive results and they spend the entire sum of their day analyzing those "signs" from their spouse.
From someone who lived, breathed, and died DB for almost a year I will tell you that it is a total waste of time.
I see so many areas of concern with your sitch that I wonder what the value in what you are doing is. If you can't focus long enough to read and digest the information you are reading then maybe a new approach is in order.
It is important that you realize a few things.
By the time you get here your sitch is much more damaged than you realize. I doubt a few post or some chapter in a book can fix it in short order. What you can do is start to work through the grief and pain that is sure to come. By being with like minded people who care and take time from their day and their own pain to help people they will never meet. That in itself has value. This is a LONG process and you must know that regardless of how it turns out. You WILL survive it. In life you don't lose. You learn or you win. That is it. Please set proper expectations. No one will give you a magic pill that will somehow change what’s in your wife’s heart overnight. If you are serious about saving your marriage then strap up your boots and settle in for a long curvy load with plenty of potholes and cliffs. It is a battle of attrition and in the end you will have won or you would have learned.
This is much more about you at this point than it is about your marriage or your wife. Of course right now you will neither understand nor realize the truth in that statement. In changing you, you will affect all those things in your life you want to influence. The answer is in you. The peace you seek is in you. The love you crave is in you. Weird I know but true. In time that will make sense.
You see the sooner you remove yourself from the situation that is causing you anxiety, pain, grief, and all those emotions you don’t like the sooner you will see positive changes in your life and the way you feel. Maybe, and this is a big maybe, you wife will be there to notice them and react or maybe not but if you have truly lived for you it really won’t matter all that much.
Sounds easy right? Not so fast. It is anything but. Everyone comes here seeking the same thing. They all want the same outcome. To be reconnected with their spouse and live happily ever after; swearing to change and become the man/woman their spouse always wanted. They read everything they can get their hands on try any technique they find in order to convince their spouse that the change is real and that somehow even though the majority of them have already made up their mind they should somehow give the marriage another chance. In essence what you are asking that person to do is do a 180 on a decision that for most of them has taken them months sometimes years to come to. They have convinced themselves that they are right and we want to come in with promises and dreams of a new and improved life together because of some new found knowledge we only recently discovered in a book.. Based on what? Something you read? Your words? Your pleads or tears? When you look at it that way do you realize how ridiculous you sound?
So what do we do? Admit the fact that you have very little control of the situation or its outcome but you can start working on healing right away. That is hard and it is painful but extremely necessary because until that reality happens you will find yourself in eternal mourning. Please understand that this process does not happen overnight and no one single thing will start it. It is a progression of events that build up little by little until one day your first thought is not your wife or your marriage. It is what you have planned that day.
It is time for you to sit and ponder as to what went wrong. We all do it, might as well get it done early. It is also important for you to realize that less of half of what your thinking went wrong is actually accurate. As I stated early, when we think with emotions our vision is blurry and our thoughts distorted. Right now everything is your fault. Your wife has every right to feel the way she does and she gets a treat you like garbage pass because after all the pain and misery you put her through how could she not. She will accuse you of all sorts of things and call you names. You will believe them and wallow in self pity. All par for the course and you need to know it. However, in her endless criticism of you and your actions there will be some legitimacy, your job is to figure out what is true and what is BS. I imagine there will be much more BS than truths. How do I know this? Because it is the status quo of every spouse seeking a quick exit……
Now that you have given some thought as to what you would like to improve about your life it is time to get to work.
Unless you are an offensive linemen for an NFL team you don’t wear 75LBS nicely. So I notice you have started to workout, good! If you are waiting for your spouse to notice or comment on it don’t. You are doing everything for your benefit not hers. Take control of your life. Get your paycheck back! What is this idiotic practice of giving your wife your paycheck so that she can give you an allowance? Are you a child? Your paycheck is your paycheck. You worked for it you earned it. This should not be complicated to figure out.
No one is going to tell you what the future will hold but if you maintain your current trajectory you will drive this marriage right into divorce court.
Two things you need to start worrying about. Your wellbeing and your children. I cannot stress enough how difficult this is on children and you rarely see the effects right away you seem months later. You need to be there for them, spend time with them, love them, reassure them, and be a role model for them. Don’t worry about what your wife is doing. Don’t worry about her interactions with them. You do not own her and any control you thought you had is clearly an self created illusion. You do have control of you and your impact you have on your children.
I don’t subscribe to the idea of letting the spouse do as they please while I sit around working on myself theory. You are still a person regardless of pass transgression. You are worthy of respect and honesty and while she might want to be with you at the moment she should still treat you as she would any decent person. There are boundaries you must have and everyone picks their own. I had mine that were firm you must decide what they are for you. Be advised though that constant fluctuating boundaries are more damaging than they are helpful so if you lay one down make sure it is something you can live with, if not don’t bother (isn’t that right Denver?)
Well you have plenty of reading material. Best of luck! Remember…..you win or you learn but in life you never lose!
