Steve, these resources are so helpful-- I really appreciate it. We're in the process of scheduling MC to see how that goes. Glass says it is better to just focus on MC if you can rather than having two processes going at the same time-- I'm not sure about that yet. H thinks I need an IC to help me process the anger. I'm not sure, think I'll see how it goes and go forward from there. The last time I was in IC it felt like she was more reinforcing my feelings than anything else-- it felt GREAT, of course, to have someone 100% in my corner, but not necessarily great for my M. Also, I partially feel like my H should have some level of connecting about my (hard-earned) feelings of anger and betrayal-- they shouldn't just be my problem that i process on my own.
Though I'm chewing on this and also wayfarer's comments. What is mine to work through, what is his, and what is ours? Why am I having such a hard time with the concept of forgiveness? Wayfarer, what you wrote about your exH bringing your A into every conversation... I cringed when I read that, because I know my H feels the same way right now about our life together. He could have written every single word. I WANT to get to forgiveness. I just don't know exactly how to do it. Maybe part of me is still scared to let go. And/or I don't feel my H has sufficiently sat in understanding just how $hitty his behavior was towards me and how it felt on my side to be betrayed by the one person in the world I thought was there for me no matter what.
My H thinks I keep moving the goal line, that he's giving me everything I asked for and I never want to focus on the positive, just the negative. For example: I spent more time on our anniversary reflected on the $hit way he had behaved during our last few anniversaries than feeling positive about the progress we'd made since then. True. Why do I do that?
Or, for whatever reason, even though he's told me he doesn't love her anymore, he loves me, he wishes it never happened, it was a horrible mistake and he wishes he could take it back and make different choices-- all the things I was wanting him to say-- it still doesn't feel like enough. I feel like I want him to realize and verbalize to me that he was mistaken when he thought the feelings that he had for her was love, that it was just a stupid sad middle-aged fantasy and he feels stupid and embarrassed that he even believed for a minute that it was "love."
He thinks it is unhealthy for me to be so focused on things he did or did not feel in the past. That I should focus on the present and also focus more on OUR relationship and how we feel about and treat each other today, not how he previously felt about someone else. Also, he can't authentically tell me right now that he thinks she's a stupid POS or that he didn't ever care about her at all, so won't, that maybe he'll get there eventually but he won't lie about it and so that is kind of where we are. Which when I'm feeling rational I can agree with. But also I have this other part of me that just isn't okay with the idea that he did have a fully-fledged relationship and care about someone else IN THE MIDDLE OF OUR MARRIAGE. Someone awhile back (Alison? I wish she was still around) suggested I might need a ritual to end M1.0. Maybe something like that to let me be okay with the fact that we weren't really married during his affair? (But I thought we were? It is all just still really anger-inducing for me.)
He is VERY motivated to get us to have these conversations in front of a trained professional. He told me he really really wants to talk about this, all of it, but thinks we really need to do it in MC rather than on our own, and I think he's right. So he has been in contact with the MC and working on scheduling (which was earlier a goalpost for me-- he'd been all over scheduling MC back when he wanted to check it off as a waypoint towards D, so I'd felt like it would mean something if he was the one to take the lead in scheduling MC for us. And now we're here, so I'm counting that as positive.)
Anyway. Forgiveness. Easier said than done. Will keep you guys updated on MC.
xx M
Me (46) H (42) M:14 T:18, D9 & D11 4/19 - 12/19: series of escalating BDs 9/20 - present: R and piecing
