Huge Backslide After Affair Recovery

[hopeOK]

Thanks, Cali... I appreciate your perspective. I have definitely thought about what you said- that this whole deal was to detract from what he did. But in seeing him go through all the emotions related to what I nearly accused him of doing, I know it has been a major thing for him. He has been more mad about it than I have ever seen him in our 14 years and he has cried about it when we have talked about it (nearly every time) & I have never ever seen him cry prior to this year. Never. He is not a crier and definitely not in front of anyone. So I do know the emotional trauma of what I said was there.

I do think he was tiring of how I was sometimes handling the affair. I would make sarcastic comments or make jabs at him related to the affair. I did have times of making healthy decisions on how I processed everything but I wasn't always so good. So I understand that I was not always making good choices in how I brought my fears or sadness to him.

As far as the GAL, 180, detach... How much of this do you continue doing when both parties want to work on the relationship? I think I need to do something different as I think about all this stuff far too much but if we are working on our marriage, actively, both of us, the last thing I want to do is go out & do lots of stuff outside the home as this is what resulted in his affair in the first place- me withdrawing & finding fun things to do on my own. I am it saying I want to become a recluse & never go anywhere... But now that he wants to fix things, I do not want to go back to my old ways.

As far as 180... It is hard for me to figure this one out. 180 from when? We have been in various stages of our relationship.... From before affair, to recovering from affair, to seriously contemplating divorce (for him it the hurtful thing I said & for me it was all the things he was doing to hurt me in his anger), to now wanting to fix things. We both agree that things were going pretty well before he read what he read (with the exception of my unhealthy ways of dealing w/ the affair) & that was when we were putting all the focus on getting closer & building a better marriage.

I reread parts of the book just now, especially the infidelity chapter & no where in that chapter does she say to GAL... She says to do more things together & build the relationship back. She says to talk about the affair but spend time together not talking about it at all. She definitely says also to look at what caused the affair (ours was me withdrawing due to him being so critical) & address that.

So while I get the GAL, 180, & detaching for the person who has the spouse that isn't wanting to work on the marriage... But at this point, finally, I think my h wants to & has started to make changes to be transparent.