My wife wants to separate

[GH31]

So you don't think my situation is different?

No.

It sure feels different!

They all feel "different", SM34. But as I mentioned before, it happens in the lives of 35% of men who get married. There is unfortunately nothing unique or different about any of our situations.

However, when my wife first dropped the bomb, this was the exact convo:

Wife: hey we have to talk, there is someone else

Me: WHAT??? REALLY??

Wife: Yes. I am sorry, I don't know why I am having these feelings. I feel like I want to ask you for 6 months off from our marriage so I can figure out if this marriage is what I want, or the OM.

I heard the exact same thing. So have many other posters before you and I. Almost word for word.

All part of the predictable script that affairs follow.

Again, there's nothing unique or different about any of our situations.

ME: And for 6 months you will "date" this guy and then what about our marriage? What about our daughter?

Wife: I don't know. I am so confused. He makes me feel incredible.

Script.

Heard the exact same thing. The exact words.

I need to figure out how to make her feel incredible.

You probably know how to do it, SM34. You did it before when you and your wife first fell in love. It can be done.

I'm going to buy the books you recommended tomorrow. I think I will start with the "Attraction isn't a choice" because that sounds like it will give the secret of attraction, which is what I need QUICKLY.

Good.

Both books are very important THE Man's Guide to Great Relationships and Marriage and Attraction Isn't a Choice. The latter book and the one you mention is more geared for dating and meeting women but it goes so deep into what actually makes a woman feel attraction for a man that it is an absolute must. If you apply what is in that book to the letter your life with women will never be the same again.

THE Man's Guide is also of paramount importance. Its author actually used David D’Angelo’s and other writers’ material to rescue his own marriage from the edge of the abyss. David Cunningham deals here with attraction in great depth but also with male/female communication styles. Both of these books are priceless.

There is also a chapter in there about “how to create attraction quickly” if your marriage is on the rocks. So get it, read it, and apply it.

By the way, my W was "on the fence" about the whole EA until she had an intervention with her best girl friends who have only known her a few years and dont know me at all.

Your wife is still on the fence. She said she’s confused.

Mine did also.

Another thing, Rule #3 if you like. Affairs very often have their “hangers on” – “friends” on the scene which were unknown before but are now part of the landscape and which make up the whole “situation”.

She came home from that meeting and brought on the D and all that BS. She hadnt even been talking to this guy but just 2 weeks! As Michele says in DR, The Biased Shoulder! It is so powerful to someone who is looking for approval or validation of their sitch.

No surprises there.

By the way, you cannot give your wife self esteem any more than you can make an unwilling crack addict stop using. You can love her, support her, build her up, compliment (and in a healthy marriage you normally would) her but you cannot make her love herself.

There will be more waffling, vacillation, fence-sitting, “confusion” etc. whatever you want to call it. Most likely, and again, all as per the script.

Keep up doing what works when your wife is at home and post here as often as you can.

Your journey is just beginning.

GH31