Making every effort to save marriage. Please help.

[AnotherStander]

One question, when you say validate her, do you mean agree with her saying she's done and wants to separate and divorce?

Hopefully you read the links, especially Wonka's validation thread which I think is a sticky at the top of the forum. But validating is NOT agreeing, in fact I usually tell people NOT to beg/ plead/ reason/ negotiate/ agree/ disagree/ etc. Validation is simply acknowledgement of her feelings. She says she wants a divorce? You say something like "that's not what I want but I understand you feel I've neglected you for quite some time and that divorce is the only option, I understand why you feel this way and I completely support your decision." That acknowledges her FEELINGS while also highlighting that yours are not the same, and it also reinforces that it is HER decision, that you are not making it for her, but you will support her no matter what she decides. Please, by all means ask more questions if you don't understand validation because one thing I've learned here over the years is a lot of people think they're validating when they're really not.

Thanks guys. Today was horrible. Horrible. I feel like I'm going to just break down and lose it any minute. No contact from the W.

Sometimes it's a little painful to read these things because it reminds me of things I went through that I've since forgotten about! Oh man, do I ever remember those days of constantly checking email and my phone to see if W sent something, and the heartbreak of not hearing from her. Just awful. Unfortunately you can't take a shortcut through this pain, you've got to feel it to get through it. Just take it a day at a time and if that's too much an hour at a time.

For the first time since this all started i feel truly hopeless.

There is hope for as long as you continue to hold onto it. It's not over until YOU decide it's over. If you need some hope then read the "Another Divorce Busted"! forum (surprisingly few people here even know it's there), it hasn't been updated in quite a while but there are a lot of inspiring stories there of marriages that were saved against all odds.

Question in regards to gifts on anniversaries and such. The anniversary of the day we first met is on the 15th.
Am I to not send W a card or message or anything just to let her know I'm thinking about her?

You're not supposed to give gifts or a card for any milestone, she'll see it as pressure. My 20th anniversary came up not too long after my W left, after discussing it here I ended up talking to her about it, I said something like "given where things are right now I'm sure you don't want a gift for our anniversary, but maybe we could go to dinner not as a date or anything, but just an acknowledgement of the anniversary." She agreed and that's what we did and it went fine. It didn't change anything one way or the other, but I had no expectations that it would.

Thanks, Azzork. I hope I get the opportunity to listen and validate. Still completely dark on her end, too.

She's not "dark" per se. She doesn't want contact with you right now, and won't for quite some time.

I see she pops up on FB, and I'm sure she see's me, but she's not saying anything.

I know it hurts, but you've got to get used to it. This is your "new normal".

I'm having trouble with the "You didn't break her so you can't fix her thing". I've got a lot of guilt from how bad of a husband I was. Controlling, jealous, possessive, unsupportive, negative... Just plain bad.

And you should try to change those things about yourself to be sure. BUT, like Azzork said, no marriage fails because one spouse was perfect and the other did everything wrong. It's like most car accidents, both parties have some amount of blame. It might be 50-50 or one may have more blame than the other. Usually it just works out that our spouses got tired of it before us. I was darned near the WAS in my M many times. But BD has a strange psychological effect on the LBS, they may have been as unhappy as the WAS but BD suddenly turns them into a pathetic lovelorn mess, LOL! And early on we blame ourselves for EVERYTHING. Do take stock of your faults and work on them, but I'm sure that once the fog clears you'll remember it wasn't all your fault. So you are working on your problems and she needs to work on hers, that's what Cadet's quote means.

"she can only hurt you if you allow her to" pass through my head. It gave me some peace, if only for a moment.

Well, when you're married a long time the two really do become one. BD rips part of you away suddenly and (usually) unexpectedly. That hurts, and it hurts for a long time. It's not that she's intentionally hurting you or that you're hurting yourself, it's just the transition to your "new normal" that hurts so much. You'll probably emerge from this happier than you've ever been before like I did, but it takes time. And I don't want to downplay what you're going through or sugar coat it, it is agonizing! Just take it a day at a time and try to see that in the end, you will be a better person, you will thrive and your W may very well choose to be with that new and improved you, so don't give up hope