Still fighting...

[Liz11]

Liz - I'd been wondering how you are. I am glad to know you're OK, even though I am sad for you with the nature of the update. That's awesome that you've been able to have such a helpful IC. It sounds like there is stuff going on with that that is bigger than your M, although it affects it.

Is your H in IC? It sounds like he has a lot of work to do, too.

I don't have any advice/suggestions other than interacting with him less. Give him space to figure out what side of the fence he is on. I know that is markedly easier said than done, and that GAL is tougher than normal.

I am sorry you're going through this again.

Thanks for your support, Sam. I'm grateful for my IC, and for some of the other things I've managed to clue in on as I've done my own research. One of my biggest struggles -- and a big regret of mine -- is that I didn't clue in until the last few months about the more ambient traits and mindsets that I know was eating into me and eating into H, even while he was drifting back closer after the first separation. By that, I mean, being sullen, being hypersensitive, being argumentative, etc. With a lot of my own reading and help from IC, I've seen how that makes most people in relationships with someone like that anxious and pressured, so its really no surprise that H started to feel that way even while he was trying to salvage things. I'm doing my best to keep it at the forefront of my goals to work on. I've gotten much better at working through the bigger outbursts -- I really only had one over the past year, and that was when my H did something pretty hurtful before leaving again -- but even then I shouldn't have reacted the way I did, and I said things I didn't mean or believe. The more ambient stuff is harder. I can remember a time when I didn't think that way, both before our relationship and for a long time during it. I also know when it started to creep back in. My IC is very hopeful that I can work through it given that its something that seems transient.

My H is also in IC. He's only been back in it regularly since he left again, and he's told me that a lot of what he's working through is the things I said that really hurt him, and the experience of feeling like he's in a pressure cooker. H recently admitted that he's also starting to understand how insensitive he'd been and acted when I was hurting long before we separated, and he feels very bad about that. There were moments like that, but at the end of the day, I know this is more about how I reacted and processed through things, and the negative traits and mindsets that set in in me for a very long time.

I'm doing my best to give him space. I keep reading the rules my IC has given me plus Sandi's. As for GAL, I had an enjoyable evening yesterday with two old friends, so that was nice. It got my mind off things a little.