I have read a few threads on the board recently, despite not posting much. I got sucked into Gordie's tale and his wife's crazy behavior. I am terrible at not heeding Mach1's advice to not extrapolate too much from other posters' situations onto one's own. One person had written in Gordie's thread that their spouse had been an MLC wallower for two years before running and running. So now I'm convinced that's what's in store for me.
I’ve been going through Gordie’s thread as well and I had the same reaction. I don’t know if I could wait it out as long as he did. I’m trying not to project that to my own situation, but it left me feeling like I needed to pull the plug. After a few days of anger and reflection, those thoughts subsided a bit, but left me feeling indifferent about my W. Not sure if that’s a good thing or not, but it’s something.
Originally Posted by Doug54
I try not to borrow tomorrow's trouble today, but I do wonder how to play it if W's mindset is to have sneaky fun on the side without blowing up the family (and filing herself). What if there's no movement on her part next summer but I'm tired of where the marriage is? Technically, neither of us can kick the other spouse out of the house. I feel like I need a sort of game plan to keep in the back of my head along with a potential drop-dead date. Does anyone think next summer is too soon for such a date? That would be about a year and a half hence the start of my situation. I also would want some sort of confirmation of the extent of W's waywardness, before fully nuking the kids' household.
My W seems to be in a very similar place to yours. Doing nothing to push the separation forward (She halfway filled out some paperwork and told me to complete it weeks ago and has said nothing since), we still live together although she sleeps downstairs now, and I’m worried that she won’t make any attempts to move things forward unless I do something to really upset her. I set a drop dead date of next June, which would be about a year from BD. But it does seem a bit weird to set a date without knowing how things will be at that point. If things are a little better, do you still file for D on that date? If they are the same, then what? What if things get way worse before that? What if I spend a bunch of time thinking about it and W files next week? Waiting forever doesn’t make sense, but making decisions 6 months ahead of time doesn’t really seem to either. Hell, six months ago I barely had a clue there was a problem! I guess it’s about just being prepared for the worst while taking the rest day by day.
Originally Posted by Doug54
Some also favor the alpha male tactic to "win back" respect.
.I’ve thought a lot about the alpha male tactic because I’m pretty beta in many areas of my life, such as making decisions, planning things, reaching out to people, being social and addressing conflict. I know I can’t change my personality into the stereotypical alpha male, so my focus has been more to address my passive behaviors and try and change those things for myself. I think the term alpha is interpreted differently by each person here, but for me I’ve just tried to define it as sticking up for myself and being less of a yes man. Having conviction in what I say and do if I know it’s the right thing. Being more of a decision maker and taking the lead with things. It’s a work in progress, but that’s where I’ve focused my efforts.
Also, DnJ, I appreciate the input you provided here. I had intended to post something similar as Doug the other day on my thread, but you and the other people who replied here, pretty much addressed all of the things I was thinking about. Most of the questions stemmed from reading Gordie’s thread, which had me feeling a little down.
