Stuck On You

[Raine]

Considering where you are now this may seem like a silly question, but looking back, is there anything you would have done differently? What's your sage advice for the rest of us still holding on to hope? Thanks so much!

I have thought about this...a lot. A lot of what ifs. And yes I think there are things I would have done differently, just like I could look back at other periods of my life and think, I could have done that better too. But to be honest, I think we would have gotten through this, no matter what. I just think if I had done some things differently, it would have slowed the process down considerably. It's pretty clear there isn't much I could have done to speed it up. Had I taken my moments to lay down my boundaries at any other period of time, it likely would pushed him away. It may have taken years and years. And by that time, both of us would have likely moved on too far to work on coming back.

I do know and feel with all my heart that I was always the one that he wanted, deep down in his heart. Back before my DB ninja skills took over, I made a heck of a lot of mistakes. Needy, clingy, anger, guilt, etc. I pretty much told him we were better off without him and he is just like his loser father. I'm ashamed at how that anger took over and lashed out at him. Sure I can justify it. I'm two weeks pregnant and he is leaving me and the kids "just because." Yeah. I was ticked. There is lots and lots of stuff that I hope he has forgotten...But he didn't divorce me then or seek a lawyer then. So even at my worst and biggest regrettable moments, he was still holding on to me.

So more what ifs...what if I had never called him out on his cheating? He would have never left the house. And maybe that would have been good in someways, but probably not. Remember how it was when he came back home, still in the throws of depression? It was way easier for me to not have him living here while trying to juggle everything. It would have been way too easy to get angry at him, dealing with everything I was dealing with, while he sat around and slept and watched tv and did nothing. I needed that time to get strong myself too.

I proved to myself I didn't need anyone. I was always confident, but now I'm extremely self assured....something that H has said is extremely attractive to him. He always thought I was too, but when he moved back in, he was so amazed by me. So anyway...if he had never left the house, I think this would have taken a heck of a lot longer. I think my sitch moved pretty fast because he got to experience 7 months without me. He got to really figure out what the issue was. I was able to get completely out of his way. It also allowed him to experience some things he felt he missed out on, only to learn, he really didn't miss out on anything.

I asked him last night if there is anything he wished I had changed. He said no. I asked him, what if I had told him that I wanted to work on us, that I wanted him. He said he would have questioned it. He would not understand why. I said, what if I gave you all the reasons, that I loved you, I wanted us to be a family, I cared about him, I couldn't imagine my life without him...He just looked at me strangely and said no. He would not have believed it. He said that he felt there was no way someone like me would ever want to be with someone like him. He felt so horrible about himself. He said there was nothing I could have said or done to change it.

Now there are for sure non-DB moments that happened. But those moments are the ones that H talks about. I went against the DB mindset at those moments, because I felt it. I knew it was what I had to do. And those moments are what became the wake-up calls for H. Those are the moments he hit rock bottom, until the final one where he slammed to the bottom and knew if he did not change things, right now and forever, he would not have me as part of his life. And he couldn't risk that. He couldn't risk losing me as his best friend. Relationship/marriage/intimacy had nothing to do with it. I was the person who could see him. I knew him. I loved him for him and cared about him with no other motives behind it. He could not stand the thought of losing that. He would lose everything else, just for the sliver of friendly connection to me.

I felt like DB goes against human nature. But by golly, with a MLCer, it works. It totally works. No matter the outcome, if you do it right, if you focus on yourself, you're going to come out of this great. Because either the MLC is going to start questioning why the heck you are so happy and why the heck they are not with you, or you just become extremely attractive to others.

Confidence is incredibly sexy.