Questions without answers...I'm tired of asking.

[RosaLinda]

"i'm going to take a page from linda's book and begin seriously teling myself i'm seein good things coming."

"Ok, me too! Not my style, but what I have doing for myself lately isn't really working either. So why not. Positive thinking here I come. I read the Secret, I can do this.

So Nero, I positively can say I feel like I'm full of sh!t saying it, but I will move away from that or die trying. Here's to a good spin."

Wow, I am truly honored that you guys see me as positive, some sort of positive influence. You will probably take it back when you read my whiny update on my new thread. And Dawn Marie, saying that you positively feel like you're "full of sh!t" does NOT count as thinking positive

Dawn, I read what you wrote yesterday:
"I can't get past this. If I could only get past the EA friendship I could stand, that is the one thing that makes me run away.
Get rid of the POS or I will get rid of you, that's what I tell him!!!!!
How wrong is that!!!"

I understand how hard it is for you. Your H had a PA with this woman in the past. They are no longer having a PA, but now he feels like "saving her" is some sort of penance or salvation he needs to do to make up for his past life, and he wants you to "accept" her as some kind of friend he is helping out financially and emotionally.

It would take a far stronger person than I am to be good with that. The fact that the person he now wants to help, (you said she is crazy and an alcoholic to boot, right?) is the exact same person he had a PA with would stick in anyone's throat and make it hard to swallow their anger and pride.

But I think that is what you need to do. You do not have to stay there living with him if you cannot bear it another second. I know it hurts you that have told H to get rid of her, but he is not able to at this time. These EAs are some sort of obsession with them, and it hurts.

But from what you have said in the past, your H is more open and more aware about his MLC journey than the rest of the MLC spouses here. He understands that he is on a journey and has asked you to try to accept it and to let him complete it. That, to me, means that he realizes that the EA is temporary, and that it has an ending point.

What do you think you could accept about this friendship? Can you see any boundaries you could make that would help you to be able to bear it, and at the same time, enable H to complete the journey he knows he is taking?

I have a lot of trouble with setting boundaries. They have to be enforceable, and something meant to help us.

I know that it bothers you when he goes to see her at the bar, but at least that is a public place. Maybe you could tell him that he can only see her if you go with him? Would it make you feel better if you tried to think of her as some type of charity case, and go to the store to buy food for her with him? Give her some of your old clothes?

Maybe these are just too Pollyannish for you, but they are the sort of things that would help me to be able to bear their friendship, and to stand a little longer.