Newcomer's sad story

[Accuray]

Gabs,

I know how you feel. Everything inside of you is telling you to pursue this woman, to show her that you're willing to change, to prove to her what a good man you are, to prove to her how much you love her because certainly that will melt through the ice and bring her back to you. It *has* to work! How could it not?

These rules here don't make any sense -- how could moving forward and giving her space bring you back together? Doesn't that just give her permission to leave you sooner? Doesn't it seem like you're just endorsing what she's doing and playing into her story that you didn't love her enough because you're willing to give up so easily?

The other thing I'm sure you think is that your situation is different. Your time together, the circumstances of your marriage, the bond you share together is just different and more special than all these other situations. The rules don't apply to you because your marriage and how you feel is special. Plus you're a good man! It's not like you're a bum who doesn't support his family or lays around the house drunk all day! You're a good provider and a good father so why is this happening?

Therefore, pursuing your wife, and proving that you love her, and demonstrating your changes to her MUST be the path back, it simply must. It makes all the logical sense in the world.

Do I have that right?

Your situation IS different from everyone else's, and your wife IS different than other walk away wives. However, there are literally thousands of people who have come through this site over the years -- thousands. 100% of them think what you think and tried to do what you do.

When your spouse wants to leave and you want to stay, the reaction of the LBS is 100% formulaic and consistent. It is utterly predictable. AND IT NEVER, EVER, EVER, EVER, EVER EVEN IN A MILLION YEARS WORKS. WHAT YOU WANT TO DO WILL NOT GET YOUR WIFE BACK IT WILL PUSH HER FARTHER AWAY.

WHAT YOU WANT TO DO WILL NOT GET YOUR WIFE BACK, IT WILL PUSH HER FARTHER AWAY.

WHAT YOU WANT TO DO WILL NOT GET YOUR WIFE BACK, IT WILL PUSH HER FARTHER AWAY.

The thing that is common among you and everyone else here is that your spouse is "done". When people are "done", the way they think and act is also formulaic and 100% predictable. The "I love you but I'm not in love with you" speech that so many people get is delivered almost verbatim among a population of people who have never met each other.

The way that pursuit is responded to is consistent across people from all different ethnic, cultural and religious backgrounds.

When someone is done, they want out, they do NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT want to be pursued.

They are not open to seeing your changes

They are not open to having your love proven to them

They are not open to being reminded of the past by reading their old love letters

They are closed off. Your attempts to tear the wall down have only one response -- to build the wall higher.

This is 100% predictable and repeatable again and again and again which is why the rules are the way they are.

The rules are rigid because you cannot be "a little bit of a pursuer". You cannot "peacock your changes only a little bit". Either you are pursuing or you aren't. Either you are making your changes believable or you aren't. Half measures will not work. You have to put all your chips in the middle and be "all in" or you're not really doing it.

You asked about success. There is no guarantee of success. As Winston Churchill said of democracy, this is the worst system there is except for all the alternatives.

Most people here do not get their spouses back.

Why? Because by the time you get here, you are already past the tipping point. Your marriage is already over and you are trying to salvage something that has already escaped you.

Secondly, most people LACK THE DISCIPLINE TO FOLLOW THE RULES. They keep backsliding, or convincing themselves that it's okay to break the rules, and then building elaborate justifications and narratives for why it's okay, and they continue to sabotage themselves over and over and over again.

The reason the success rate isn't higher isn't because the program doesn't work, it's because it's too hard for most people to do consistently because they don't have the discipline for it.

I have been on this site for 4 years and I've seen a lot of cases come and go. There are absolutely many great successes to be found here where the person DID have the discipline to do it right, followed the rules, and got their spouse back. Many many cases.

In other situations, people do everything right and still do NOT get their spouse back. There are no guarantees.

My other observation over 4 years is that everyone comes away from this site a better person. It is an excellent environment to journal, to process your feelings, to work through this transition in your life among an amazing group of people who can not just sympathize but empathize. They know *exactly* what you're going through and how you're feeling, and more and more of them arrive every day. You are not alone. I have made lifelong friends here.

For my own part, I did get my spouse back and we enjoyed another three years of marriage. At the end of that three years, I was able to leave the marriage without regret or guilt, because I *knew* that I brought it. That I was the best husband and father that I could be, and became a man that only a fool would leave. Aside from the birth of my kids that feeling is the greatest gift I have received in my life -- to have a clear conscious about my role in things and to have no regrets.

This site and this program can do that for you, and you take that with you no matter what happens in your marriage. If your situation does not work out, you will take your learning and your new relationship skills, and your changes into a new relationship with a great degree of confidence because you now KNOW you have the skills to make it work. That new relationship may be with your current wife, or may be with someone new, but either way a great deal of happiness awaits you at the end of the tunnel. You can't see, feel, or believe it where you are now, but I promise it's there and it's waiting for you.

Acc