Card29 VII

[Card29]

Earlier today, for the first time since BD, she asked me how I think she "failed" as a wife. First she asked me if I thought she was a good wife. I think she was feeling insecure after the porn confession. I told her that she's a wonderful wife, told her about some of my favorite qualities of hers. But then she asked for specifics of things she could have done better. I told her that she took her frustrations out on me for a long time, even ones that had nothing to do with me, and that drove me away for her for a long time. She agreed. I didn't mention anything else, didn't want to pile on at once. Others things include meeting my shortcomings or failures with anger and/or shaming. I think I could have overcome my porn habit a long time ago if she had met me with love on the topic. Instead she just expressed her disgust. I was already ashamed of it. More shame wasn't going to fix it. I also think that's why my accountability groups never helped. Those didn't pull me away from porn with love. They just made me want to avoid even more shame. And eventually, the shame of confessing slip-ups grew larger than the shame of actually looking at porn. So the lies began.

Then I was so ashamed after viewing porn, I didn't feel like I deserved to sleep in bed with my wife, so I would sleep on the couch. That robbed us of our only intimate connection time. We used to talk for hours in bed, no TV, no phones. That disappeared. Then when when we were close, or we did have sex, the intimacy kept dwindling. It turned into "let's get this over with" for her, it turned into "why can't we do this more often??" for me. She told me today she felt violated during sex for much of our marriage, which hurt to hear. not because I forced of pressured her, just because there was no intimacy.

I pray everynight that WAW's heart softens, because I truly believe we can build a new marriage. Look how much I've been able to piece together, and we've barely had more than a couple of convos on the topic. I just imagine what we could do if she actually committed, we were able to go to Retrouvaille or something, go to a good couples counselor. Maybe someday

Tonight was more bitter than sweet. Last night in my house. D2 is with me. It was her first time seeing it without furniture (I have two air mattresses, that's it). She was most confused when we went into her room and her bed was disassembled. She was a little upset. It bothered me because I realized she had slept in her first bed for the last time already (items an infant-through-2 bed, convertible). Eventually I had to leave the room from her and cry for a few seconds. The rest of the night has been good, though. Watched Classic grinch again (she knows the song now), now she's sleeping next to me on one of the air mattresses.