Boundaries: Cheat Sheet

[Ready2Change]

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A boundary is to protect yourself, and it must have ramifications if it isn't honored.

Let's say your W starts screaming at you, here is an ineffective boundary:

"Stop yelling at me!"

Or what? There's no stated ramification. So she keeps yelling at you and you yell back, or you sit there and cower.

Another ineffective boundary:

"Stop yelling at me or I will ask you to leave."

You can't make her leave, so your ramification is completely dependent upon her choosing whether or not to honor it, and that makes it worthless.

Effective boundary:

"I will not tolerate you raising your voice to me, if you continue to do so I will hang up/ leave."

THIS is a good boundary, because if she continues yelling then YOU take immediate action on your own. If on the phone you simply hang up. If she calls back immediately you don't answer. If it's in person you leave the room or even the house.

So now that you know the difference, you need to understand that if your boundary is going to be something like "I will not remain under the same roof with you if you continue to engage in an affair" then you've got to A) determine a consequence for that and B) be 100% ready to follow through. When you're talking about an A, there is little you can do as far as a consequence other than separate or divorce. And you've got to be very sure you are OK with that, because that is probably what she wants anyway and basically you'll be doing all the hard work she doesn't want to do!

Please note that this isn't "effective" in the sense that it changes anything on her part, because it probably won't. It is effective because it protects YOU from further harm, damage and heartache resulting from her A.

So that's a boundary. As far as canceling Netflix and such, that's up to you but just understand it won't change anything and she will probably think you're being petty and vindictive. Frankly that's kind of a passive/aggressive NGS move.