WW, A ended, but struggling to reconnect (My 11th)

[hoosjim]

I don't know if your W understands what it means to affair proof the M. I leaned through my own experience that knowing you trust each other, is not enough to keep you from stepping over the line into that inappropriate area. Claiming to like men more than women for friends......is not good enough. Claiming to not have hung out with very many since the A (boohoo).........is not good enough. The fact that one or two other women are with her and the attractive doctor while they drink.......is not good enough. Is it? Did she do this long before her A, or has it started since the A?

Your W is either insensitive to your pain after her cheating, or she is not behaving like an educated woman who has learned from experience how to affair proof the M. What will it take for her to realize she cannot repeat similar scenarios, without the high risks? Maybe the MC is failing to talk about that part. The spouses have to affair proof their MR as much as possible. Sounds to me like the MC has not addressed what clear boundary lines look like in a MR after an A.

This took up the bulk of the MC session on Wednesday. In fact, we were already discussing it when the MC dialed in to the teleconf session. I had called her on way home because we were going to be getting home too close to session start time and I had wanted to continue our discussion about the "Wine Downs" at work.

Basically, I told her I was more concerned about her understanding of appropriate boundaries and not making the same mistakes we had made before rather than any specific thing like the "Wine Downs" which, at least at the moment, appear to be "innocent" if ill-advised. Reminded her this particular concern was particularly apt because she still couldn't say "exactly how/when she crossed the line" with OM, so I thought we should be trying to identify what those boundaries should be so didn't make same mistakes again. Also told her my main concerns arose when she was not keeping me advised of where she was and when or when she sprung things on me at the last minute (surprises) both of which she has actually been doing very good with recently. Told her I wanted her to "have a life outside of us", as I did for me, but that I obviously wanted the priority to be on us, and especially so when we are trying to work our own troubles out in the MR.

For her part, she said that with the OM, while she couldn't say exactly when she "crossed the line" that she was in a place due to having "stepped out of the marriage" and "being done" that she felt like that was something she could do, the implication being that now, where we are now, she does not feel like she is "out of the marriage" and so does not consider herself vulnerable to such line crossing. Also, she said that these get-togethers were just social, not intimate, and that most of the conversation had to do with goings on at work and letting off associated steam (it is a pretty hectic workplace with quite a bit of disgruntlement amongst employees for various things.)

We also discussed her feelings of having to "check in" or "ask permission" to do things, which she said she always felt in the past like she had to do, but which sort of surprised me since I never thought I came across as any kind of jealous or suspicious or controlling. She pointed out that I had been just saying over recent months whenever I was going somewhere that "I am going to__________" and that was it... I never asked her feelings on it or "if it was okay." This is, of course, true... I have been doing that ever since 180-ing, and GAL-ing while A was ongoing. She said that seems kind of like a double standard.

Ended up by pointing out the importance, in any marriage, of keeping each other informed and checking in with spouse before doing things or going places-- not as a control thing but just as a common courtesy thing.

Since you asked about these after work get-togethers, she probably started doing them a few months, say 6, before the A started--probably about 2 years ago. Sort of coincided with her whole bff- inspired effort to "expand her social circle" and her mentally/emotionally "stepping out" of the marriage.

Re: BFF, who is moving away to a distant state in June, W said-- "I think I would like to be able to go visit bff once every two to three months-- airfares are cheap to there, what do you think about that?" My response was that it was kind of situtational, and I thought to myself having to see ANY friend, that far away, that often seemed a little unusual, but that, in general, she could make her own decisions about what friends she wanted to see-- she knows how I feel about bff and about how I view that dynamic. In that context, discussed what are "button pushing" situations for me, most profound of which are "girls weekends" and that, given her silence on their beach weekend last July where OM was at same beach and I know for a fact he was at same beach but they have never acknowledged it, I don't think that that particular type of trip I would be willing to sit still for her taking. That was her opening to open up about that trip but she did not, instead saying "We won't be planning any more beach trips" and also saying that when she went to the beach last Fall to get away that she "did so alone" (which I also believe-- I was still monitoring her at that time.) But nothing further did she say either denying or acknowledging that anything happened WRT OM at that July trip. And, yes, that still bothers me.

MC assigned us some reading and trust-building exercises as well as some touch exercises.

From my own IC sessions, it seems clear that MC will talk to her about boundaries and avoiding past mistakes and affair-proofing, and, as well, some of the readings and exercises she gave us touch on those issues... but it will have to be me to bring those up, I think.

W said she would be making future IC sessions and asked me to show her how to work the video conferencing.

Other odds and ends: She seems excited about our Mexico birthday getaway in May... keeps asking about, asked yesterday if she could have a clothing allowance for cute beach and resort clothes.

I am being deliberate with lighter touch, giving her a hug and/or kiss on way out door in morning... still seems like that is fairly awkward for her. Going to have to take the initiative on the touch exercises MC gave us.




ANd to clarify, I did not directly respond to her question about wanting to go see bff at the time she raised it, it came up later in the context of button-pushing situations, and, even then, I did not indicate any sort of consent. In fact, the discussion about bff concerned particular triggers and trips, not her desire to see bff every three months. I did NOT tell her she could "see bff whenever she wanted" or "go see her every three months." At the time she made that initial comment I kind of let it pass and steered things back to what we had been talking about-- the "Wine Downs" and boundaries.