So we have a big conference next week where we are supposed to hash out a settlement and it's making me really anxious. This may be one of the very last times I'll see her and I've been doing a lot of reflection.
After the BD, but before I got DB/DR and before the TRO, I screwed up big time by doing all the things a LBS isn't supposed to do: cajoling, arguing, showing her pictures of good times, etc. I can't help but wonder if I had discovered DB sooner if things would be different.
She refused to see me face-to-face after she left. She would make appointments for us to talk and then cancel, etc.
A week or so after the BD, I sent her a long letter apologizing, explaining what I thought did wrong in the marriage, explaining the changes I had made and was making, and how things could be different if we both tried. Her response was actually somewhat positive. She said I said beautiful things and that she would love to work on them but that we needed a separation for a long time. She said to get better and that we would keep talking but she couldn't make any promises. I screwed up by saying I was worried the longer this went on, the harder it would be to reconcile. Pressure. Oops. About a month later she filed the TRO.
When we were talking before the TRO, she said that she was going to leave earlier, but stayed because one of my parents died. I was despondent and without DB, so I said that I wished she had because it would be easier to hate her. Now I am concerned that she filed the TRO in part to make it easier to hate her. If so, it didn't work.
I have some questions for you guys, especially the vets and any former WAWs that might be reading this.
I know that as a LBH, there's nothing I can say to change things. Her fog has to lift on its own. But I know my wife and I'm worried she may assume the worst about at me and think that I hate her, that I'm trying to screw her with the settlement, etc. I've seen her do this with her friends and co-workers where once they are on her bad side, she reads everything they do and say in the worst possible light.
I really feel like I need closure and I need to apologize one last time, this time directly to her face at the conference, and let her know I don't hate her. Is there any point to this? Will it only harm any future hope at R? Divorcebusting is so hard when the WAW's complaint was not enough pursuit / engagement!
My therapist (and myself) think there may have been an OM at some point for various reasons. I know the common wisdom on the internet is "once a cheater, always a cheater." Do you guys think this is true? I don't know if I do or not.
How can I forgive myself for throwing my marriage away? I honestly don't know how.
