Help Please: 2

[Terapin]

Wow, T.

First:

- 'You haven't mentioned this concert in 6 months, and we agreed then that tickets were way too expensive.'
- 'I've just been living my life. You said you wanted and needed space to think.'
- 'I haven't been ignoring anything. I was open if you wanted to talk'
- 'Can you list some examples?' She really couldn't, but the few lame ones she did I validated
- 'I never said or thought you're a terrible mother.'

Where is the validation in these responses? Have you read the validation thread recently? You were responding tit-for-tat and that will get you no where!! Especially since she was "half drunk". Please do not engage with her when she is half drunk. She is only going to remember parts of it anyway.

Also, what prompted her to say something about the Metallica concert when you got home? Did you confront on that? Why not just ignore it? She texts "got tickets". There is no question in there. No need to respond. If she brings up later "Yep, I got it, hope you two have fun."

LISTEN. VALIDATE. Do not get into the kind of responses you got above.

DBing, GALing, detatching, etc seems to have had a negative effect on hopes of reconciliation.

T, this is another common mistake by LBSs. They dabble in DBing and then when things do not immediately turn around say "DBing doesn't work!"

The problem here T is you haven't really DB'd. 5 times in 3 weeks doesn't GAL make. Sorry it doesn't. When we say GAL we mean stay busy ALL THE TIME. Have plans or things to do all the time. Preferably out of the house, but even in the house, be actively engaged in other things rather than following her around the house, or sitting stewing in your own thoughts on the sitch.

Also, why do you think this is negative.

Let's review her half-drunken accusations:

- 'You knew I wanted to go to this concert, but YOU never made an attempt to get tickets'
- 'You've been out running around doing God knows what, instead of talking to me about stuff'
- 'You haven't even mentioned our R in the last 2 weeks. I have no idea what's going on. You're ignoring the huge
elephant in the room'.
- 'You've never cared about what I want or need, and that's why this whole thing started'.
- 'You've been doing things with son, which is great. But i just know down deep you're thinking I'm a terrible mother.'

The first one sounds like a reaction to you being sad or hurt or upset you weren't included (bad on your part by the way),. so I will ignore that one.

The next 2 ARE TYPICAL WASs responses to DBing! This means it is working! She expects you to be mopey and sad, and woe is me. To be constantly badgering to discuss the state of the R. Because that is the natural reaction LBSs have. The whole point of DBing is to change that reaction to one that more proactive and helpful. When you start detaching better, and start GAL better, she will feel a loss of control over you AND REACT. They never react positively to losing control, at first. But as it becomes the new normal then she will start to react better to it. Remember DBing is really for you and getting you ready to move on whether that is with or without her. If you are doing just to get her to react positively then you are doing it wrong anyway.

The 4th one is no different than her false accusations on BD. So why is that negative?

And the last one is her guilt over ripping the family apart, and, in essence, being a terrible mother! People guilt always cause them to accuse someone that is doing things of right of condemning them. My cousin and I lived together several years ago. We both were brought up in the church. Once he moved in to my apartment he quit attending church since when he lived at home his parents stipulated it. I however still attended both worships services on Sunday and midweek Bible study on Wednesday night. He told a friend of ours after a few weeks "Steve just attends church so much to make me feel bad." LOL I attended that way before we lived together, and I attended that way afterwards. It was his own guilt condemning him, not me or my actions.

On the positive side I guess, she did get referrals and research two MCs, and said she probably is willing to go, but wants to have a few IC sessions first (which she has scheduled).

I guess!? LOL T, are you generally a negative person? This is huge. This shows that what little DBing efforts you've made so far have already got her thinking she might want to save the MR! How can you type this and still think DBing hasn't worked towards potential R?

Also, you then say: "Again, this conversation went on for 2 hours. There was tons of stuff said. I think I hit the main points."

That's because you didn't listen and validate. If you listened and validated this likely would have been a 15 minute decision. When you engaged in tit-for-tat about her saying ridiculous things, and her being half-drunk ON TOP OF IT, you prolonged the agony of this discussion.

I hope you don't think I am being too harsh. I tend to be blunt. T I'll be honest, I see a lot of potential for you saving your marriage here IF you continue to improve your DBing skills and let the process work.

Thanks Steve. I appreciate it.

Yeah, I guess I've been pretty negative about all of this!

As for the concert, when I got home she asked if I got the texts. I said ya. She started saying how much she's always wanted to see them, how she's already so broke (financially) that it doesn't matter, etc. Yes, I reacted badly, and was 'hurt' that she made these plans without even considering me. Not even so much about going, but my feelings on taking our son. Again, this isn't a Wiggles concert

As for validating, no I didn't do a good job at all. But after being bombarded with all of this, I wasn't worried about validating her feelings. I know, bad move.

Regarding DBing, I say it's not working because it doesn't seem to be getting any results in our MR, except making her mad. I know the MC stuff is good, but our first conversation after BD she said that it's a possibility. Maybe she's more serious about it now, but again, nothing seems to have really changed in her overall feelings towards me/us.

One other thing she kept bringing up. When we were dating, and up until we got married, she was dealing with some serious issues, and essentially the bottom fell out with all of her closest friends. I was the one that 'stood beside' her dealing with all of it. She said that's when she realized that I was 'special', and wanted to marry me. This whole situation is somewhat similar, which is why I question the detaching part. Not that I'm 'turning my back on her now' whatsoever, but she probably perceives me acting 'as if', going out without her, getting D papers, etc as such.

She was also very open to talking about her EA with OM. I don't know if that's good or bad, but it's certainly a change. It's confusing to me that she's 'making amends' with all these people that she hated a few days ago, but it really made me mad that she contacted OM again for any reason. And worse, she was actually defending him on some things (like how his current loser situation isn't really his fault). Again, it seems like she's more mad at him for shutting things down and exposing texts to our friends, more than she's actually 'over him/it'. Maybe I'm reading too much into all of this, and the whole 'don't believe...' stuff is true. But this is the kind of thing that makes me negative about the whole sitch.