LiM: One Year into Piecing

[LiM]

Ginger,

How do you really know when someone is truly remorseful? I think you just have to go with what your gut tells you. With my W, she is not someone that can really pull off being fake. If she's not being genuine, even if crying and saying the correct words, I can spot it a mile away. But if she is being genuine, I can also see that. I have seen both and I believe I saw genuine remorse after the A ended. For her, once ending it was forced on her, she had to start coming to grips with what she had done and where she was in her life. Even tough I feel that I saw true remorse in her, I still wish I had kept her at arms length for a while longer. She never had to work hard to get back into the M. There were conditions that I put on her so its not like I just took her back thinking we would go back to being in a normal R. But I wish I had done more. I wish I had been stronger and made her work to get back into the R. The DB process has LOTS of advice on how to deal with a WS while they are wayward but not a lot on what do when the waywardness stops. I wish I had "rules" to follow for when that time came.

Bluwave,

I'm so glad you stopped by to offer some support. You are spot on. Its SO easy to sit here and offer out advice. Its a much different story to actually take your own advice. So often, you need someone else to step in and deliver the well timed 2x4. Thanks for doing that for me. I can see the 2 scenarios you laid out playing out in front of me. I have no idea what its like to be wayward and have to fend off those feelings. This is just as hard for her as it is for me. Even Sandi says that it took her a full 2 years to really come to grips with what she had done.

As for what I have been doing over the past week since discovering the text messages, I've detached significantly. I've been keeping VERY busy. I've decided to have NO expectations and work on not being so "needy." The result is that I have seen a HUGE change in my W's behavior. She has become significantly more talkative and affectionate. She's initiated ML twice this week which is unusual for her.

I'll continue with that strategy and we'll go on our trip to Germany in just over a week. When we come back, I have an IC appt and I'll discuss the text message with my IC and then talk to my W about it. I do plan to take your advice and bring it up in a non confrontational manner. I'll just tell her how it makes me feel without passing judgment or telling her how what I think she should have done. And we'll see what she has to say about it.

Tomorrow, I'm going sky diving. This was a birthday present from my W. I jokingly told her that it was a murder for hire plot so she could get rid of me
Send police if I don't post again! (kidding). I'm looking forward to it.