So so new to this :(

[Rita]

Nyla, hello. I have been avoiding writing replies to most of the posters of late but did read your thread and just so far felt you were in good hands with everyone else here. And of course, I still do. But I just wanted to say something about your last post --

NOTHING YOU HAVE TO SAY TO HIM WILL BE HEARD BY HIM.

I know EXACTLY what you are thinking and feeling because I have been there and I am sure all of us have. I am in year six of MLC and I STILL sometimes say something to H thinking that he will hear it. Not only does he almost never hear it but generally he twists it into something totally different than what I intended.

If you have a chance, read my last post on Roist's thread, about writing the letter releasing your expectations of your H. I think you really really need to do that. It won't feel any different right away but it will help to articulate it and start working on releasing those things.

Here's the thing that helped me the most on these boards -- I mean, outside of the friendships I made here, and feeling that some friends out there understood me and even liked me! -- it was something I read somewhere that said that we can't change the MLC or do anything about it really. We can only choose to outlast it.

What you are doing now is putting your H in a box. Inside that box, he will do all kinds of nasty ridiculous things with nasty ridiculous people. You can choose to open the lid and take a look but it will only make you feel horrible. The best thing to do is to bury the box in a metaphorical garden and plant some of your favorite flowers over it. And one day if your H wants to, he will dig out of the box, climb those flowers, and come back. YOU CANNOT MAKE HIM COME BACK. Not with words, flowers, rational arguments, nothing. Only he can decide to come back, and at that point, he will either see your openness and forgiveness or will see that the door is now closed. That's the outlasting part.

I am positive that his relationship will end. They always do. That silly little selfish girl is obviously carrying a counterfeit of love. Their R is based and built on lies and on the misery of three other people. It is not possible that anything good could ever come out of it. So you don't have to worry about that being anything real, it will end for sure, though I totally understand your feelings and don't think it's possible for you to believe me at this point no matter what I say.

All you can do is take your thoughts captive when they come, recognize that your heart is gonna ache for a long long time -- and that that is a good thing, because it means your love and your vows were/are real to you.

If you are a person of faith, there are lots more ways to do get through this pain and to surrender your H. But if not, I recommend talking to the trees, the ocean, the garden, the stars. Tell them about your pain, about the injustice of it all, about how it's too much for you and you can't go on with this much pain. Ask them to take your pain and take your H and heal him. Ask everyday, many times a day. Seek to surrender him, and to surrender all your expectations of him.

Then with him -- Stop having real conversations with him. Be kind whenever you can, but without any expectation of kindness in return. Do not encounter the OW, you don't have to and there is no reason to legitimize their adultery. Let H do all the work and don't take anything he says seriously unless it's about making visitation plans. He will say many horrible things. Put those in the box, dig it up if you have to add more of his crazy talk to the box, and plant more flowers over them.

Don't think it will stop hurting anytime soon. It won't. You are just training yourself to outlast it. Even if you don't choose to stand and to take him back one day when he wakes up from the nightmare he dragged you all into, you still need to outlast it.

Sorry you are here. (((Nyla))))