My WW and the Great Sandi2 Experiment - part 2

[Chris73]

I have to post here because I have no one else to talk to at this time of night. After the kids were asleep, my W approached me and said,

"I have the opportunity to do some traveling over the next couple of months and I just wanted to make you aware of it so that you can plan accordingly."

She then elaborated that she has plans to go away for 2 days over the Presidents Day weekend, and she also has plans to go to Florida for 5 days in March.

At first I felt like I had been run over by a car. It was the same feeling I had when I had discovered the original affair with OM1 back in May. I was flabbergasted. I didn't know what to say.

So at first I said, "Ok, that's fine. I will plan accordingly."

Then I made another rookie mistake and said, "I dunno, I kinda feel weird about this." She said, "Weird how?" (like she didn't know!). I said, "Well, I mean you're telling me that you're going to Florida for 5 days but I think it would be good for me to know where you'll be and who you'll be with."

Then she got a slight attitude and said, "I'm going to Clearwater Florida with a bunch of girlfriends."

So I just followed up with another "Ok."

......

I swear this woman throws me a curve ball just about every night.

The good news is that we have agreed to talk about splitting up our finances on Friday. So at the very least I will feel content that she's spending her own money on these trips.

As far as who she's REALLY going with? It's a mystery that will never be solved. And frankly, if I'm trying to lovingly detach, it doesn't really matter who. It could be OM1 or OM2 or it could JUST be girlfriends. But even if it's girlfriends, there will be plenty of "hookup" opportunities.

You know, I did a lot of soul searching today and decided that I wasn't going to force the issue about moving forward with the divorce when we discuss our finances on Friday. I was just going to treat it as a business transaction and not bring up any other topics. I spent a good deal of time doing some journaling exercises, writing down all the reasons why I want to save my marriage and trying to identify how many of them are fear based. And I concluded that while of course there ARE some fear based reasons, there are more reasons that are based around love, friendship and the potential to build a stronger relationship than the one we had.

So this whole traveling thing really threw me for a loop and put a huge damper on the positive attitude that I had when I came home from work. I felt like a servant. I have rearrange my work schedule and make arrangements for my kids to get picked up from school while she's out partying in Florida? EFF THAT!!

But then I thought about it another way. Let's say that my W and I had a happy marriage based on mutual respect and love and trust. If she came to me and said I want to go down to Florida for a few days I would still say, "Ok have a great time" and would plan accordingly. Is there any difference between these two situations that I have any control over? She's going to go regardless, I can't stop her. And what do you think her reaction would be if "forbid" her to go? Just more hostility, more anger, more resentment. And these are the emotions that I am working so hard to diffuse.

This is really getting difficult for me. I'm trying as hard as I can to harness this negative energy of jealousy and resentment and transform it into positive energy to improve my own life. But it's really effing hard! I really just want to crawl into a hole and not come out.

I'm really going to need to prepare for this next coaching session. An hour will not be enough to cover all the things I need to talk about and since it's the last one I paid for I need to get as much advice as I can.

So, I guess for the LBHs on the board, what would YOU do in this situation?