Separated/MLC No Change

[25yearsmlc]

[quote=skhdive]You are amazing. If I can accomplish 1/3 of what you do I will be satisfied. My sister and her 3 sons and one gf are going up too so we should have a lot of fun. I am close to my sister.

That's^^ huge! Thank God your sister is there and has sons too. Blessings!


I have isolated myself since we got married and didn't even realize it until H left. I have some work to do to build up my self confidence and get myself out into the world.

All I can tell you is that it's worth it.

And make no mistake, others are just as self conscious as you are. You may see someone fun there with friends and you'll have to remind yourself "she's there with friends so it's pretty brave of ME to come to this alone" and know that a lot of us out there will realize that too)

I signed up today for yoga in the park never would have done that before and quite honestly I am nervous to go on my own.

Have a sense of humor about the yoga b/c when I went, the moves were SO out of my league I had to laugh at myself for trying. But the more I laughed, the more fun I had. No one judged me.

I also joined a book club a month ago and do enjoy that.

I hear what you are saying and believe you are correct now the hard part for me is putting myself out there after 20 years of marriage.

Been there, done that. Overcoming our initial resistance is usually the hardest part.

IF you end up going into the dating world, you'll feel "weird" at first. But 1) you might still reconcile and 2) it gets better anyhow.

MY older sister was abandoned by her h after 22 years, 3 kids and her working the whole time putting him thru law school and then partnership track, etc.

When she began dating the man she ended up marrying, I asked her how it all was at first. She said "really weird, not all bad, but definitely surreal." And they kept dating and when her ex h woke up and wanted back into their marriage, it was finally just too late.

SHE had awakened to the reality that not every man is constantly irritable, moody, whiny and negatively programmed.

I asked her about taking him back and she said "I'll always feel bad abut the divorce for the kids. But now that I know what it's like to be the priority to a man, I can't see going back to what ex h and I had."

She is happier now than she ever could have been, with her ex. And only by his breaking her heart, could she discover that.

I also re read your earlier post and you asked how I was changing myself so M can be better so that would be to be more confident in myself encourage H to do his thing without trepidation

Bear all this^^ in mind for your future relationships regardless of who they are with b/c

if you feel secure in who you are, then only an idiot would cheat on or abandon you and since you don't want to be married to an idiot, you are better off without them.

Yeah, I know that is nice to read but hard to FEEL and believe but in time, if the changes you make are real, it'll happen.

stop asking so many questions about what he is doing and think more about what I am doing.

YES! And besides, you have NO control over what he is doing. Do you want to spend your precious time on earth on things over which you have no control?

Tomorrow is promised to no one. Life is so very short.


I used to be more silent because that is who I am but for some reason along the way I became this talkative person I think because I felt like if I didn't ask him questions he would think I didn't care.

Maybe...maybe you asked questions b/c you felt fearful he was pulling away. ??


Traits I am working on will be not to over analyze or think about h or what he says lots of work here needed). Not feeling that I HAVE to talk

Let others fill the silence OR learn to embrace it. Silence used to mean "everyone feels awkward" to me, but then I realized that I come from a family of extroverts.

Sometimes just being with or near someone is sharing the time with them.
But normal people are okay with silence and I have come to savor it when it comes.

and realizing that all of this is not all my fault because that is how I have felt.

THis^^ might be true but it's not a "trait" to work on. You may not have flaws you want to improve upon but most of us do. I can be dismissive, I can overly generalize and rush to a quick "verdict" on topics, and those are just off the top of my head. I'm a work in progress and I'm at peace with that.

Dig deeper and see if there might be other things you want to work on. Also, just curious, how are you about the finances if your h leaves? Have you spoken to a L? IF not, why not?

Accepting that h may or may not come back and that is his decision and that once I detach I will be ok

Oh I can actually guarantee one thing here. If you detach AND GAL, you will be more than okay. You will do more than "survive"; you will thrive.

And paradoxically, (b/c the goal of GAL is not really to "get them back" but to be fine on our own)

if you really detach and GAL, you may find your h much more interested in reconciling. Go figure.