Still Struggling with a plan!

[hopeOK]

I see what you are saying, Cali...I am working at stopping thoughts but man! Sometimes I can do it fairly easily & other times it seems impossible (the main time being when I wake up in the middle of the night or too early in the morning... I cannot get thoughts to quiet enough to fall back asleep!!). I will keep working on it though.

So about OW... I think you are right that now is not the time. I am practicing great control to be patient & wait for the right opportunity. He at least agrees that we need to meet each other's needs & not look to other ppl... But somehow I think he is rationalizing that relationship w/ her... Or he just is not caring about being dishonest. In his head again, I know.

So what do you mean by small boundaries? When do you think is a good time to start down this road? I've basically been feeling like maybe it would be time when we have lots of good feelings going between us and have minimized the negative moments. Otherwise, I just don't know how else to determine the readiness. I'd appreciate your thoughts since you have been there!

Small update...

Yesterday h texted & we were talking about $. He said - I guess I'll put it back in savings if we're not splitting up.
I said- Ok. I do not plan on leaving the relationship if we are both committed to putting in all the work needed to get us to a good, healthy, happy place. And you?

He thought I was meaning that he would have to go back to counseling & got a bit irritated (he is adamant of not repeating that painful experience after he feels he got burned after going through all that & I have said I would not ask him to go again). I explained that I wasn't implying counseling when I said work... Then I said- Well I am not asking you to go back to counseling nor will I ask... I'm sorry if I gave you that indication that I was going in that direction. What I meant by work is each make considerable effort to meet the needs of each other while also making considerable effort to not cause each other further harm.

He said he is happy to do that.

So ... Not really sure what I am feeling right now. I guess I am very mixed. Last night I was just thinking how much work we are really going to have to do to get to where we need to be & the thought was so overwhelming that I just felt a bit hopeless & that giving up would certainly be easier in many ways. And also to think that he is probably (almost certainly) not as committed to doing the hard work as I am... Even more overwhelming to think he could ever get to that place. I just don't see it.

He has again unlocked his phone & I looked at it last night. I know I need to stop & not snoop but old habits die hard. So I found a call to OW on Tuesday for about 2 min. (Tuesday late evening is when we had the long discussion & made up from my outburst on Friday. So this call was before all that.) basically confirmed what I already knew- they are still in communication. But I was surprised it was a call as that will be recorded on the phone bill... I thought they were just keeping to emails or fb messages or something. Happy to say that I remained calm & overall am not letting it bother me right now. There will be a time to deal with that.