I captured part of sandi2's thread below. This is the part I am trying to navigate through. My W and I are not interacting much and don't know how to get her to notice the items I bolded. How do I begin repairing the relationship?
First, the H has to see his own part of the downfall in the MR and work very hard to improve himself as a man. Notice, I said "man" and not H. The reason I said that is b/c the M is past the point of him showing her what an improved husband he can be. She is not interested in him as her H. If he now starts trying to implement all the things he sees he should have done in the past, it will hurt his effectiveness in getting this stitch turned around. For the WW, it is much too late, and she no longer cares about you doing those things. Based on what most newcomer LBH'S say, they think spending more time with the kids, showering the W with more attention, doing the housework, cooking, and running her errands (basically catering to her) will do the trick. A H should never do everything and leave her with no responsibilities, and certainly not at this point in the broken M with a wayward.
That leads me to the second part. As the rejected party, the H cannot enable her in this terrible, disrespectful behavior. Every time he does, it will set him back. Before he can show her what a wonderful & improved H he wants to be, he has to prove what kind of man he is. All of this still comes under the heading of DBing. His first objective should be to gain back her respect and attraction. She can't love him if she doesn't respect him, and won't desire him if she's not attracted.
She have already displayed her willfulness in continuing this A at any cost, so he has his work cut out for him. He can do it, and it has been done by others. I can not recall a case where the H saved the M and really "got his W back" by supplicating, appeasing, and any doormat methods he mistakenly thought was DBing. That is not the way to get the respect from a WW. She is tough, and the H has to be tougher.
How do I gain respect and become attractive if our interactions have almost completely vanished? I don't shower her with attention anymore, I do some housework (not all, more like 50/50), no cooking, but I do the grocery's (always have). What do I need to do to get her to possibly begin respecting me? Anything?
I don't believe I am a doormat at this stage. Although I don't know if she thinks I am one or not. It's hard to understand this one because we are civil and really not fighting about anything so why would she need to try and walk all over me. In regards to appeasing, I don't think I am doing this either. Again, it doesn't appear their are even opportunities to do this. We usually only say a few sentences to each other and really don't interact otherwise.
My overall concern is that I am not being given an a chance to show the WW that I am respectable, confident, and ultimately desirable (only a fool would leave).
Does anyone have suggestions on how I improve my odds if I am not given an opportunity to show improvement?
Do I just keep working on GAL? The 180 is also hard because there isn't a lot I can show her due to our limited interaction time.
Last edited by wiseman; 10/28/1501:59 PM.
Me-29 W-29 M 5 years (2010) Kids S-6 S-5 W Ring Off: 9/28/15 Filed: 10/12/15
