One foot in front of the other

[Elbereth]

Thank you for your words DnJ, ovrrnbw, CWarrior, and Sage4,

Their awakening is not guaranteed. If it does happen it will not be a snap out of the personality they now exhibit. It will be a quiet scared whisper of doubt. A doubt of their very existence. Their crafted reality tumbles to sand as they scramble in a futile effort in continual rebuilding and refortifying. They run from themselves.

And are easily influenced by thoughts and actions, especially those of our spouse. That is why detachment is the single best thing you can do. Find detachment and let go. For if you don’t you will be dragged around.

Do not make decisions based upon feelings. Feelings change, and then so does the reason for the decision. Utilize logic and reason.

Further down your path, after ensuring your beliefs and values are those that you want, follow your values. Beliefs are slow to change and make excellent headings in concert with logical reasoning. However, for the moment, your values are a bit skewed - as counterintuitive or untrue as that feels. Have faith in the path, and the kind and compassionate folks who have walked before.

These things I am beginning to accept and are some of the reasons I feel I can move towards D even if doing so goes against my values of doing everything I can for my MR (my principles of taking vows seriously). But I can't protect myself or work through our problems (or his affair) if my H is in La La land and I have no idea if he will ever snap out of it. Logic tells me I have to protect myself.

El, H is with another woman. Yes, avoid going on walks with him. Do not remain in the same room. He is not living there. He is just visiting, and he is not a friend. I understand and empathize with the fact that you cannot prevent him entering the house. Do not be disrespected. Place boundaries when required.

I get it, you do not want to be enemies. H will not listen and will define you as he “needs” to. He will make you the enemy if he requires that. He is literally driven to run and you are going to get the blame. It is not fair. Not at all.

Also realize he will define you as friend if that suits his emotional need. Stick to your path. Your forearmed thoughts and questions are good and will help you see clearly.

Believe nothing he says and only half of what he does.

You cannot fix him, for you did not break him.

This helps. He arrived later this evening and mostly we've been in seperate rooms. Seems he wants to avoid me as much as I do him, so that is how this evening went by. We were cordial towards each other, and it feels strange to be avoiding him, but I'm trying to just move through the awkwardness of it all.

If you can find some activity, work, house project, social life, etc (not sure how things are near you) that would be great! I would be getting out of the house as well. If nothing else, take a book to a park and hang out. That was one of my go-to's and my W often wanted to know where I had been. Reread the detachment and validation threads every day this week and you will be well on your way to the "not friends but not enemies" position that you seek.

Thank you for the suggestions. I do have a place to go to after dark as well, so I may do that in the evenings after work. And I did reread those threads based on your suggestion and even screen-grabbed them for reference. Thanks for that reminder!

Wow--that doesn't sound fun. Who are they to you now? To me, he sounds like someone renting a room in the same house. The last time I was in that situation, I think I said "Hi!" or "Goodnight!" when appropriate, once shared my laundry detergent, and once borrowed his dish detergent. If that's your view, I would set boundaries on where he sleeps (not next to you), whether you cook for him (no), whether you do his laundry (no), etc. You are no longer partners, and he's not acting remotely like a friend. Being busy or away sounds good. None of this precludes being friendly! I was friendly with that renter. If it gets intolerable, don't forget the safety valve of staying at a hotel (shared assets!) with your son.

He is sleeping in the basement, so no, not next to me. I did make dinner as I am cooking already for my son, but I also took his offer for him to cook twice this week as well. The rest is going to be up to him, but when he has been here, he's been actually more helpful and such then he had been in the months before he moved out. Our son, I'm sure, is happy he is here so I don't see us heading to a hotel, but I do have options to sleep elsewhere if needed. And ways to escape his presence as needed.

- Give yourself grace, lots of it. (Whether or not you 'snap out of the funk', you still give yourself grace. You're going through SO much right now.)

- Get out of the house as much as possible. Go for daily walks (runs, yoga, whatever endorphin-increasing activity you can). I like the idea of taking a book to the park. I believe we are in the same region and the weather looks to be pretty nice for a while, can you go hiking this week?

- Have your support network on speed dial. This isn't the week to think 'I don't want to bother people with my drama'. People who love you want to support you, don't be afraid to reach out.

- As hard (and I mean HARD) it is, don't engage in any R talks. You will never feel better afterwards no matter what was discussed.

- Don't overthink your actions and interactions with H. Nothing you do or don't do in this week is going to dramatically change the short term outcome of your situation (if H is truly in a MLC). Being true to yourself is going to make YOU feel better.

Thank you Sage for this additional advice. I do feel I have been giving myself grace knowing that I am going through a lot and ignoring it won't help me...so I have been trying to move through the discomfort and sadness as well. And I've gone on walks almost daily (and yes, we've had some nice weather in general between the rainy days) so that has helped. I do worry about R talks as I have a strong feeling he is serving me D papers this week (and there is an agreement I asked him to review as well), so there will probably need to be some words around that. I'm hoping I can just say "I'm too emotional to discuss this right now, so let me absorb it and discuss it with you later", which will also give me time to review anything I get with my L. In general, most of the convos that have come up are H's bringing up wanting to move forward with the D (other than the love note episode), so there has been minimal discussion.

All in all, I've read bits and pieces of all your sitch's so having your words of wisdom on my thread are so appreciated. I do have a small and loving support system, but honestly, no one in my life has experienced anything like this. So, even though I feel love and support from them, I find the advice or responses from most of them extremely frustrating...and I often feel like I have to defend my feelings or actions to them. So this forum, and the books I've been reading, (as well as counseling and the marriage program I did) have helped me the most.

Thank you all... I feel more prepared to deal with this coming week.