Another LBH (kinda)

[AnotherStander]

What struck me as different is most other threads seemed to have a lot more animosity, a lack of any desire of the WAW to be close or intimate (she has told me she'd like for me to "court" her again), and that for the most part things are "good" you know, except for the whole separation thing.

I will certainly not suggest you read through the gazillion pages from 10 years ago that I wrote about my sitch, LOL! However I will say your sitch is very similar to what mine was. My XW and I were very cordial and friendly after BD and even continued to have sex. We went to MC and continued to do things together as a family. This was very confusing to me and led to inevitable temp checks (before I found DBing), and each time I was slapped right back to the reality that she was 100% done. She did eventually leave and that was when it really hit home that she was serious about this. I was convinced there was not an OM even though everyone here kept saying there probably was. And surrrprisssse there was. I honestly thought my sitch was different and unique and that I stood a very good chance of a quick recon. And here I am 9 years later, quite divorced I'm not saying D is inevitable for you, I'm just saying your sitch has more in common with the rest of us then it may seem.

Damn, that hit home.

The good news is there's plenty you can do to tilt the scales! That's kind of the point of DB'ing, you make yourself into this awesome man with a great mix of alpha and beta qualities, and eventually when your W looks back then that is what she sees, not some sad, depressed, desperate wreck.

I actually told her something like that back when we were in a counseling session. And since then I have also switched my focus because I think originally it was motivated by me wanting to get her back and now it's about being the best me I can be, regardless of her or what she thinks.

That is a GREAT attitude! You are quite right, we start out doing it as tricks to get our spouse back. But if you change that to striving to be the best YOU that you can be, then your changes will become permanent.

This is such a battle and you are so right about needing to shut it down. I have a post-it note on my monitor that just says "Don't" on it. I tell myself that nothing good will come of it, best case I don't find anything which leads to more uncertainty, worst case I find something I don't want to see and I get gutted again.

The post-it note is actually a great idea. In the book I suggested (The Happiness Trap) they describe a technique you can use where you visualize a giant stop sign in your head when you start spinning about snooping and such. It takes some practice but it does work! The book has some great tips and techniques on controlling your thoughts and processing your feelings.

So why is it so hard to stop doing it!?!? Stupid emotions trumping logic.

I don't know, don't we all wish he just had a giant internal circuit breaker we could flip and stop the madness, LOL! But we don't, so we learn how to do it slowly over time. And we backslide. When we do we pick ourselves up and keep pushing forward. You are going to do things you KNOW are wrong. Don't beat yourself up over it, just learn from it and keep pushing forward. One of the guys here kept saying that he thought his wife had a change of heart and he wanted to talk to her about it. IE- temp check. Several of us told him not to, that if she really did have a change of heart then she would be approaching him about it. But he just kept saying he needed to and offering justifications. I finally told him to do it. I told him he was not going to like what he heard, but if he was spending all that time obsessing over it then he needed to hear it from her so he could get back to detaching. Well he set a date to meet with her to talk, came back the next day and said we were all right, he got BD'd all over again. But it actually helped him because he really did start detaching after that.

There's an old Simpsons where they have a koala that keeps climbing up a power line and getting shocked. And doing it again, and again. That's how snooping feels to me - I keep looking and all that happens is I get hurt.

Yes exactly, we call it "touching a hot stove" around here! Some people touch it 2 or 3 or 4 times before they learn and others keep touching over and over until their hand is blistered, red and bleeding. Some are quicker studies than others