Hi Mach1, Well, I don't know about not having the confusion and internal conflict. Maybe not the same kind of confusion and conflict but they are both there. As much as we all like to think we are our own person we do depend on a very few select few people in our lives. For me the number one was my wife. To watch the person I've known go away and be replaced by this alien is rather confusing. I will say when my W went into her depression around 7 years ago, I lost a big part of myself. I had to take over so much of the day to day and still go out and make a living and my world became smaller for sure.
Then, when she was finally out of that she started down the MLC road! Of course not knowing what was going on, I tried all the wrongs ways to get through to her and never was able to re-focus on myself. One of the things I not only want but NEED to do is find ME again. Not the husband/father me but the all around me that somehow got lost in all this mess. I've been nothing but husband/father for so dang long and with W in MLC I still need to be caregiver #1 for my girls. I had always thought that when the kids were done HS and off to college, W and I could finally be there for each other. Do the things we put off because of needing money for kids school and such. Travel, just be there for each other and not have to be a parent first and foremost. Now that seems less likely than ever.
I haven't stopped GALing, I just backed off for a bit so I can allow my W some time to help her grandmother get used to the new home she just this last Friday moved into. I've been having to pick up the kids from school and get them feed and such so she can go visit her GM which just doesn't leave time for getting out. This won't last for more than this week and I will be back to going and doing my thing next week.
As for personality/character...I have watched my MLC W try on diffferent personalities for more than a year! One of the things that she has said is she can't "find her joy" when she is with me. I believe this is because she knows that I know who she is better than anyone. She can't wear a mask with me around . She insisted on going alone to her co. X-mass party. Then I hear how everyone there thought she must have been drinking she was acting so "out of character" and this excited her. She so badly wants to change who she is, how she is seen by others. Before B-day she would talk about how she felt "invisible" to other people. How no one noticed her. She has always been shy but has worked hard to not be. She always found fault with herself and nothing I said or did seemed to help her low self esteem. These new personalities seem like a way for her to be noticed, even if for all the wrong reasons.
These new personalities conflict with her character in so many ways.At least the character she had pre-MLC. She always put her kids first. Never believed in divorce, sacrificed "things" for what was best for the family. Now she says divorce isn't wrong, it's how you act after that makes it hard on the kids. That we all hurt our kids, they'll get over it. Personal happiness comes before responsibility to others. Work and friends come before home and family, etc. This change in character allows her to also change personality without the internal conflict.
If I had known more about MLC I would have seen it coming for sure. I really don't think I could have done a thing to stop it as every attempt I ever made to boost her self esteem and let her know how important and worthy she was ever worked. All I ever got was that I was the only person who saw her this way and since I was in love with her, my opinion didn't count.
As for being able to stand for my marriage. I stayed through 3 years of depression. I have lasted through 3+ years of MLC so far and close to a year since B-day. I have listened to her tell me some of the most hurtful things another person can say to me, the taking off of her wedding ring, the neglect of her kids, a near nervous breakdown last Aug.where she had to go back on anti-depression meds and blamed her "bad marriage" for it. The spending sprees, the staying out all night, the going away for weeks at a time with no thought to me having to take care of everything. The anger and meanness. The anxiety/depression. The blame and taking no responsibility for ANY part of our "bad marriage". The accusations of wrong doing on my part that have no basis in reality. The list gets longer and I'm sure worse is yet to come. I am sure of one thing, I will stand for my marriage until it no longer has any chance. That point, if it comes, will be because of not what I decide but what my W decides and whether she can make the journey through the tunnel and if she does, who she is when she comes out the other side.
