Your r with your d is improving and what a gift that is to both of you.
If making your family and time with the kids is a 180 for you, then I think the issue of MLC vs WAW is even less important. Your changes need to be your focus. And they are being noticed.
But consistent change + sufficient time = change your w can believe in.
And even then, it may not be enough...why?
Well, b/c it took a lot of time and pain for your w to want to leave a marriage and break up a family. She may think 6 months of change on your end (much less the few you've put in) barely gets her to consider that the changes are real.
She'll also have to believe the changes will remain IF she returns to the m. Her biggest fear is that you will revert to your old ways and she worries she will have missed out on making a new life for herself A life wherein she feels valued. If you show her with your actions (and no requests of your d to "tell mom you noticed my changes" b/c then the changes are tactics, NOT true change) for long enough that she can believe that you have become the man she always hoped you'd become, then you may well turn this around.
No mother is unmoved by loving interactions with her children and their father. It's a turn on, frankly. And if she believes you really will treat her right, that you "get it" for real,
you could give a legacy of commitment to your children...a legacy of forgiveness, love and redemption.
That's A LOT...
What were you like when she met you and fell in love?
Can you be him again?
I think you can. But be patient with yourself AND with her. These changes in you are not enough in themselves, yet.
ALSO please get some tools if you do reconcile. NEW ways of interacting. Even if your changes are real AND permanent, and even if she wants to work on things, you will be back here again if you do NOT learn NEW ways of interacting...and how to let go of the past.
"From this day forward" are words in our vows, probably for brilliant reasons. The more I contemplate those words the more I think they are divinely inspired. Both of you will need to learn how to let go of the scorecard, for good.
I highly recommend Retrovaille or a personal growth workshop that many DBers have attended called Essential Experience (aka "EE", and please, check out their website.)
EE will house you so you just have to get there and pay their fee, which is the same now as it was 20 years ago. I've been to a few of these things and by far, by FAR, EE was the most profound at helping me make changes in my life.
Retrovaille is specifically for marriages in crisis. They also have a good website and are available nationwide. They charge a sliding scale fee.
You do NOT have to be Christian to attend but belief in God helps b/c they say that term and want some sort of spiritual connection between the couple, but if that is an issue, see if there is one for atheists...I honestly don't know.
Retrovaille has an impressive success rate but you DO have to get both people there. And the work is solely focussed on the couple, not each person's issues. We had been piecing for a year before I realized we were backsliding and I had NO reserves in me for that, so I proclaimed myself truly done if we did not get on track. We looked up Retrovaille and it was in OUR city two weeks later, on our wedding anniversary...so, yeah, we took that as a sign. And it was a great thing to do for us. Got us back on track with some new tools and reminders and some old tools that we had stopped using.
In an ideal world, you'd both do both.
Good luck
M: 57 H: 60 M: 35 yrs S30,D28,D19 H off to Alaska 2006 Recon 7/07- 8/08 *2016* X = "ALASKA 2.0" GROUND HOG DAY I File D 10/16 OW DIV 2/26/2018 X marries OW 5/2016
