BLUF – The W came last night, wanted to talk, told all, apologized, and agreed to conditions so she is now living again in our home.
In the evening I was talking on the phone with my sister and telling her that I didn’t expect W to come back. About an hour after that conversation, my W came by with a little gift from the tooth-fairy for my 7 year-old who just lost a tooth. It was bedtime, so she stayed to put my youngest to bed. Afterwards, she asked me if I wanted to talk.
She started by telling me how she’s feeling, what she feels for me … I stopped her, telling her that I didn’t want to hear about her feelings because they don’t justify what she did. She hesitated but finally got down to telling me what happened. She had her surf lesson, went to lunch with all of them afterwards. She got his number and texting started. She went with her GF the next afternoon to the beach to watch them surf and she took pictures. That night, the Surf Guy, her GF, and W went out drinking in downtown. They went to many bars and were drunk. He drove them afterwards to his friend’s house where they were have a party. More drinking. Then he was going to drive my W and GF home. They were in the car, and his friends as well as my W and GF said he was too drunk to drive. The GF got out of the car to go inside and call a taxi. In the car, my W and him started kissing, touching each other, and then she gave him oral sex. The taxi came, my W and GF left.
Not pleasant, but for me it is better to know the details rather than my imagination running wild.
This was the last time they actually met, although my W did invite him to two places. She has not contacted him since July 19th when I put the boundary on texting OM. Interestingly, he never contacts her first, she always initiated the contacts.
Do I believe everything she told me? Yes.
She did apologize to me too. We spoke, actually she spoke, for the next 2 hours. I don’t think somebody can come out of MLC in a week’s time of reflection, but my W was very candid in addressing her issues. She said she just felt like something was missing inside, that she missed opportunities, and was/is unhappy. She acknowledged that she’s been treating me badly. She said I was the best thing that happened to her. She said a lot.
Some interesting comments were:
My W always feels like she doesn’t have the courage to do things, such as moving out on her own. She said after leaving that night she realized that she could move out. She said that she could see herself moving out and living on her own for a few years, but when she looked forward 5 or 10 years she would be looking for a relationship. She thought about the type of man she would want to be with, and she said it would be me, and she didn’t want to be that stupid to leave me now to only look for somebody like me later.
My W says I’m not the man I was a year ago. I’m a much better version. She remarked that it could have gone the other way; with all the stress she was causing I could have become a worse version of myself. All the 180’s were definitely noticed and appreciated. She also appreciated all the things that I was doing over the past 7 months in terms of making her feel loved (per DB coach I read Five Love Languages and was applying that).
One thing that really got to her was something that happened soon after she cheated on me. My MIL who is staying with us needed a root canal. My W and I have supported her parents since we were married – 22 years. I even bought a condo for them to live in. My W’s brother has never really helped out financially. My W called her brother to ask him to split the cost of the root canal. His reply was that relations with his W were not good, he didn’t want to tell her he was spending $ on his parents, and he then told my W that she should pay all of it and consider it as paying for the babysitting that MIL was doing. One of my sailing friends is an endodontist, and he gave us a 20% discount. We paid for the root canal, and I didn’t complain at all (well, except I did remark about her brother). She said how good I've been to her and her family over the years.
Another interesting remark was how my W knows that she is filling her free time with activities so that she doesn’t have to think. A crazy gym schedule and other activities. This week, she was going to go to the gym when she was alone, but then she said to herself that she needs to think. Instead she went to a spa about a mile from our house that has outdoor pools. She spent the afternoon there just thinking.
She said the surf guy was a loser. I'm convinced she has no intentions of starting anything with him again.
She said a lot. Including a funny story about her staying at our friend’s house these days.
I have a lot to digest.
What she said was very promising. I need to see how she acts and what she does. I’m very hopeful that is the road to a better marriage, but I’m also doing so with the realization that it may be a long journey yet.
