IW.....I have asked that same question a couple times myself....
To summerize....
My wife did this so I did this...
My wife did this so I did that....
It's early still though....
Hopefully he can see how much focus is on her instead of himself....
I also did an in-home thing, for two and a half years....
Aloof, yet available, was my way....
Yeah, my attempts at detachment have left a lot to be desired. I don't know if I'll ever be in the clear while we're living in the same house.
Were those two-and-a-half years rough for you? Or were you sufficiently aloof and detached to the point where you cruised by? Did you and your W interact at all then?
Detachment isn't a place that you can walk to or anything....
Detaching is a state of mind...
It's a peaceful room in the middle of a Tornado...
A place for you to escape the howling winds surrounding you on a stormy night.
I would classify it as doing what is right, not to induce a reaction, rather regardless the reaction...
Where you can deal with your pretty little woman with the same emotion that you walk to the mailbox with.
She's spinning right now, no need for you both to spin....
Just try to dig into yourself, and deal with finding and being yourself.
Again.....Don't allow HER to define who YOU wanna be .....
The first 6 months or so, I was so over-ANAL-izing every little freakin thing my Ex did , that I forgot that I had a say in who I was too....
Once I figured that out....the rest was easy........er...
We essentially gave a great facade that nothing was wrong. She pretended to not have the first 2 affairs, once I knew for sure about them (they were over by the time I knew for sure), I gave her some space to work through it, by the time I found out about #3, I was done....
I didn't want to place a timeline on anything, however, I decided early on, that I would give myself two years BEFORE I made any decisions about my life with or without her.
Ironically, #3 corresponded with being at the end of my self imposed 2 year Mach project.
I spent those 2 years working on myself, how I communicated, how I listened, how I wanted to be and present myself to the world.
I learned what love was, what obligation was, dealt with my guilt, owned my half of the marital breakdown, and worked my ass off working toward forgiveness.
D, I spent so much time inside of my own head that I didn't have time to wonder WTF she was doing.....
Looking forward, it was painstaking....
Looking back ?
The best 2 years I ever had.... I won't do it again, however, I am thankful that I was able to find out who I am....
So I guess it's about perspective, and time spent, and what YOU decide to do with your time....
We did interact when we had to ..
Parenting, bills, schedule and such. She would talk when she felt the need, I would listen and validate. It didn't go much deeper than that, by her choice. She had a lot of anger that she hadn't worked through, or even realized that she had. Everything was normal in her world, and by her own standards...
Yet, the "shark eyes" gave her away every time....
Sooooo
You do have choices....you just gotta make them......
