Thanks

[PatientMan]

If you feel like you're playing games, don't play them.

I don't like it at all, but sometimes the counter-intuitive stuff does feel like game playing. I'm okay with that in a way if it's a strategy and it's real, but I am not okay with manipulating the sitch in general.

Who does Patient Man want to be?

He wants to be someone who rubs his wife's back when she says it hurts.

BUT...if there's a real and important reason to NOT do it (rub her back or any other example), then I can understand that. I get that sometimes the strategy is counter-intuitive, but it's confusing.

Maybe some context will help.

I used to LOVE to do little stuff for my wife. This lasted from the day we met until I started getting really depressed. We have always been the touchy type together...I used to caress her hair when we were just friends, and she would always snuggle or rub my back. Anyway, after I was sick I just never WANTED to do that stuff anymore. I wanted to want to do that stuff, if you know what I mean. I recognized something was wrong.

After BD#1 and I got my perspective, all those feelings came rushing back to me and I just wanted to do stuff for her again. I remembered why I loved doing all the little stuff all the time and couldn't imagine why I ever stopped feeling that way. So during my year of pre-DR pursuit, I did as much of those little things as I could/she would allow.

BUT, I believe I turned into a bit of a doormat, and that isn't okay. So my post-DR "giving her some space" has been to try and be somebody who doesn't rush in and fix every problem she has. Just listen. Don't be a pushover. Don't be cake.

If you're a ballerina maybe you can follow this, so here goes: I don't offer to rub her back anymore, which is a 180 from the original 180 of rubbing her back all the time (after BD), which was a 180 from when I was depressed and never wanted to rub her back, which was a 180 from when I loved doing little stuff for her like rubbing her back.

If you followed along with me then you see I've come full circle, and I'm currently fighting the instinct to do the little things. I guess I'm creating space and showing her what life will be like without me there to take care of things, which I understand the point of, but hate all together. I LIKE taking care of her, and NOT doing so hurts, but I understand it.

Regardless of all my jibber jabber, I'm just going to be me. I'm just going to ask her if her back is still bothering her and if it is I'll do what I can to help.

The whole 180 thing is extremely confusing sometimes. I'm supposed to do these 180's, but not that particular 180...see...that's a test (or something).

So in summation, I'm going to rub her back this evening when I see her, and I can do it without turning into a doormat.

That's who PatientMan is.

If what you're doing is expressing the new you, the man you want to be, then it will sometimes be uncomfortable, awkward.

It's very confusing to "be myself" and implement some 180's and other behavior modifications. Well...which is it? That isn't directed at you, specifically, it's just a venting of frustration.

I think being me most of the time is my answer, but I've got to figure out how to detach. I can't seem to accept that, or at least go through the process.

This Also, I sense that she is "on" to the thing where I don't initiate contact. Before, she didn't realize what I was doing and she was being pulled in by me creating space. Now, it seems like she sees the trend and is reciprocating the treatment.
is all mind-reading and will keep you spinning in a world created by your thoughts and emotions.

Excruciatingly guilty as charged.