So Confused and Conflicted (7)

[WshIKnw]

Exactly. Most people dont come here until the spouse is already in another relationship and/or moved out of the house. How many of those marriages would be saved otherwise? Maybe 1 in 1000? So if this site saves 5 in 1000, will anyone here really notice?

From what I've seen on the net, the odds are a lot better than 1/1000. Somewhere between 10% and 20% of marriages recover from separation. I think MWD said that 10% of divorced people remarry each other. But what I'm questioning is: How many of the people that come to this site recover their marriages? Is it better odds than the overall population, including everyone that does or does not come here or read DB material? I think it's probably better odds. But I think the most important DB rule is to do what is getting you positive results and to not do what is getting you negative results. If you are getting neutral results rather than positive results, it's also possible that you have to do it longer, but aside from that, those are the most important rules for fixing the marriage, I think. Don't just rigidly follow the other DB rules, because there is a good chance that DB doesn't work on everyone, and a good chance that it actually makes the situation worse in some situations. There is a lot of variation and uniqueness in people. To lump them all into one group and say "they all work this way" -- I'm skeptical of that. Yeah, we all breathe, eat, sleep, etc., but when it comes to psychology, there is a whole lot of variation.

I know had I come here at the first signs of trouble, my marriage would have been saved. But, like you, I didnt realize the severity of the problems we were having.

That's such a shame, that all that love goes to waste because people couldn't see what was happening. And it's a shame that that is such a common glitch in our psychological systems. Why I couldn't see there was a huge need for change before my wife flipped the switch, I don't know. I think that's the fault of both of us: mine for not having the experience or knowledge to know that when she complains I need to take it seriously, whether she seems happy or not, and her for giving mixed signals about how happy she is in the marriage. It's salvageable, easily, I think. But once she flips the switch, it's hard to flip it back, especially if there is a wife-stealing POS in the way, and especially if she really slammed that switch to the other side.