Newby here, desperate for some advice

[sandi2]

Hi JRuss, glad you found us, but sorry for your problems. If you will stick with us, and post often, your support group will grow. It takes time (a sentence you'll grow to hate) to get where you want your MR.

I'll start by telling you that I was a wayward wife. I felt just exactly the way your W has described her feelings. I suspect she doesn't really know why she doesn't feel attraction for you. I suggest the lack of attraction is not something that hit overnight. Anyway, I'll get back to this subject later.

It is great the effort you have made in improving yourself. Outward improvements count for a lot. You said you had read a lot of self-improvement books, so do you feel you have made inner improvements, as well? I would be interested in hearing the changes/improvements.

I think the majority of newcomers are maybe surprised when reading some of the threads on the board. As you said, you are looking for practical ways of avoiding a divorce. What will probably throw you is that the ways are not what you think or feel should work. DBing is counterintuitive. If you can enter into this with that fact firmly planted in your mind......you will be able to overcome your argumentative and logical reasoning, when you read some of the advice.

We went on a brief vacation with the kids, and I vividly remember she said she needed to go pick up candy for the kids (it was Easter weekend, so the Bunny could come), and I asked her if I could go with her, and she gave me this look I'll always remember: just this wave of revulsion and disgust washed over her face.

You know, I used those very adjectives once, and the LBH I was posting to, said it was really harsh. Anyway, it truly describes the feelings of a W who is no longer attracted to her H. You see, it's more than not being attracted to you.......it's her feelings going beyond the lack of attraction to some very nasty feelings that H's would not believe their W is capable of having.

Anyway, in the middle of all of that, we had a big fight on the way to work one morning, and I just said something to the effect of "Why can't you just tell me what on earth is going on with us?!?!" (Because I never, ever could get her to tell me, really, what the problem(s) are/were). And she told me that she was no longer attracted to me.

Yes, it's true. We women are guilty of protected men's egos. With our H, we will push down those negative feelings we have b/c we know he'll be crushed if we actually put it into words for him.

This just crushed me. It was (and still is) such a massive, crushing blow to my self-esteem, like I'd been killed in a way.

See what I mean?

What little I could get her to explain seemed to indicate that she lost her attraction over time, didn't "feel supported" when we had our second child and took a step back career-wise (it was 100% her choice), and just stopped seeing me in that way. She said she "struggled with it for years" (but didn't tell me, or try to get us to work on it???).

She doesn't have a clear answer for you, b/c this is just her list of things, cause you kept pushing for reasons. So now, you will turn the attention on yourself and how it's your fault the M got in this place.

She's very, very sad about it. She knows how much it hurts me. We've had many very intense, tear-filled conversations about all of it, and, with my nature (I always want to talk it out, brainstorm solutions, connect through sharing), I actually thought these represented progress, since she's much more guarded about her feelings and always has been. I've recently learned it's just the opposite, though: she told me that she's felt smothered and emotionally bullied when these have happened, and that she thinks I tell her all about my feelings to make her feel guilty. This wasn't my intent, at all, and it breaks what's left of my heart to hear her say it and realize that we're even further away than when I started my bid to "fix things".

JRuss, your W doesn't want you to fix things. You won't believe me right now, but in time you'll understand.

Her plans and what she really wants have always been sort of vague, but she's never walked back the "you're not attractive" bomb. I've asked her to go to MC, but she's resisted. I haven't been able to get past the idea that she could start having these feelings, grind away on them apparently for years, not tell me anything, and let things get so far that she was done before I ever even got the courtesy of knowing, without me really having a chance to work with her to change our relationship to something that could be mutually satisfying (like it was for the first 15 years or so). So that all of what's transpired since is just purposeless. It's so far outside of anything I'd have ever done that I still can't get my brain around it. I feel like she sandbagged me and never really gave me a chance. And that makes me angry and depressed.

Then how are you going to take it when I tell you the problem is not you? It's her. And guess what? You can't fix her.

Just recently, we had another of those intense relationship talks, and she got so upset she almost moved out. Said she can't take it anymore, wants to live a life while she isn't yet old, and (real dagger) wants to see if there is a better fit for her out there in terms of a new man, thinks I'd be better off with someone else, etc.

Ah......now we are getting a little closer to truth, but have a lot more waiting to come.

She texts her friends constantly, which is somewhat new. In a moment of weakness (I'm ashamed), I saw one set of texts that were about how she's stayed in it for years because of how much she knew it would hurt me but wants to see what is out there, that maybe there's someone else who could be better for her, that she deserves to be happy, with the friend (also my friend, at least until then) just being a complete echo chamber reinforcing her, telling her she deserves to be happy, that I'll be ok in the long run, that I "need to grow".

This is important. I think there is a lot more, so please try to brace yourself. Do not ask her questions, b/c she won't be completely honest.

She knows I'm checking to see if any of it is helping, so it isn't and, really, just puts more pressure on everything and drives her further away.

Very true!

I feel like I may have one last window of time, but it will close very fast as things start to shift to real decoupling, putting house on the market, etc., and I just want to be able to say I really did everything I could, in a way that had a chance of success, as opposed to what I've been doing so ineffectually.

Great! Then you are ready for DB information cramming.

Those who've done it -- how do you persuasively act like you don't care if the 180 is working? I feel like it would take Meryl Streep-worthy acting ability that I decidedly don't have, and, without that ability, I'm just doing more pursuing. Bottom line: I have so much sorrow and fear and anxiety in my heart that it is just really, really hard not to let her see it or sense it, and so I never get any traction being able to demonstrate that I have the ability to be self-reliant.

First tip.......you don't try to persuade her of anything, except that your b@lls are firmly attached (borrowed this phrase from another LBH), b/c that's the first and foremost attractive part of a man. Hey, without them, you might as well be just a girlfriend!

So she continues to see no future with me that would be worth it.

Second tip.......stop doing what doesn't work. Your way has not worked, so I hope you are ready to do the DB way.

Nobody can guarantee a divorce won't happen, b/c there is another person who has her own self will and makes her own decisions. However, we can share some techniques that do work and you'll stand a better chance at saving your M.