WAS or what (recap for me)

[roist]

Posted 30/01/16

This risks being a long one. I am journaling to record my thoughts/events as much as to get feedback.

For the first time in months my W met with inappropriate friend today. I don't know if they were alone but I do know it was relatively short and I am 100% sure they just talked. I was told they would be meeting in advance by W. Long story short this ate away at me while she was gone.When she came back I didn't know how to react so I withdrew into myself.

I was not proud of not knowing how to react and how I withdrew.SSo when we went to bed I defended myself by attacking! I asked her why she ignored me all night. She was very surprised by my question as she thought I was ignoring her
And this is how our first R talk in almost a year to the day started

I said I was tired, a bit sick and had had a few drinks and almost excused myself out of talking. But that screamed of typical avoidance that I was guilty of earlier in our M. She encouraged me to rest if I was tired and I almost did. But I didn't want to take the easy way out even if she said we could talk about it another time.

I asked her if she discussed us and she said not really.I asked her to look me: n the eyes and reply again.She reiterated not really.This is the only the only time I doubted her words. I said it is not normal to chat with another guy and definitely not OK to chat about marital problems especially without speaking to H/me about it. She said we must have different definitions of friends if it is not for that. I said we definitely have different definitions of a couple if private stuff is talked about outside the couple and not inside it.

Although some of what I said was fairly firm, everything was said calmly and as a discussion not an argument.

Anyway this lead into R part of the conversation. Again I almost ended it to obey the rules here. But how am I ever going to convince her or me that I am capable of such communication if I never try. I was mindful of the rules, guidelines and advice here and I think I was pretty damn good at abiding by them, apart from the no R talk rule that is!

I validated a lot. I expressed myself well, but concentrated on W and not me. The only time I mentioned my feelings was when I said it was hard to try to talk to someone detached. The conversation wasn't in English so detached is the closest translation to the word we used. She admitted being detached and being so for a long time. I asked if she wanted to stay detached and she said she did not know. I was not needy or pressuring when asking.

This brought us to the part where she saw no solution.I said calmly there is always a solution, one way or another.I acknowledged how hard that must be for her, but I did not pursue any solution.

I took advantage of the moment to express my feelings about when I was home when my dad was dying. She thanked me , acknowledged I should have done what I did and played down my absence.

We chatted a bit more. And I asked her not to try convince here of anything but just to know, what she held against me or why she detached. I did not talk enough. I was bad at communicating. She felt she had to decide every thing on her own. I accepted these, added that when I was depressed I wasn't capable of more, but I am now. I did not try to convince her of this as that is something to observe rather than be told. I did not apologize but I acknowledged that it would not have been easy when I was depressed.

We chatted more. And at the end I was unsure how to play it going forward d, so I wondered about that. There was no real answer as I guess neither of us know.But I preferred mention it instead of ignore it.

I also stated that regardless I do not regret our story together.She said she doesn't either, especially our boys. I again acknowledged her part in raising them. She has been great.

Yes I did a lot of acknowledging. This was more me verbalizing what I thought than trying to compliment her.

I told her that although some of our conversation was not nice to hear, I was glad that we spoke.SShe said she was too. Actually I did not find any of the conversation hard to hear. I took no pleasure from her saying she was detached but I knew that anyway.

Maybe tomorrow when I reread these words or when I rethink about this I may be more affected, but for now I am v calm and detached.

My W was calm, was human and never critical or judgemental during this exchange. It was good. I don't know if anything changes after this.But I outlined in details so ye can advise.

After sleep and rereading the only change I would like to make to what I posted is that instead of speaking of her as detached, checked out is a better translation of what we said.