If my counselor wouldn't have told me and if in the beginning he wasn't acting so erratically, I would say that he just doesn’t love me anymore and truly doesn't want to be married.
He hangs out and goes to church with his family, plays golf and helps our sons with physical things they may need. Just so cool, calm and collected. He doesn't act like a lot of the others I've read abt. He never reaches out to me and hasn't since Feb......I just don't know if I'm dealing with MLC.....I just don't know.
Two major hallmarks of MLC are depression and confusion.
A snippet from your first post:
Originally Posted by Whatlee
BD was Sept. 11, 2022, 2 days after his 51st bday. We have been married 31yrs, I've been with H since I was 15yrs old. Weeks after the BD he was so irrational like a chicken with his head cut off, opening up separate acts, looking for second jobs, walking around with 2 cell phones hanging out with a 25yr old co-worker, smoking pot, drinking. October he filed for an online divorce, as if I was gonna sign that...SMH He would have rage some nights, calm/emotional some nights just all over the place. November 28th I came home from working 16hrs to find an empty apartment, he had moved everything out. I had no place to go as our apartment was tied to his job.
For what it’s worth, I think H is in crisis.
Most MLCers wear a mask. They keep a pretty tight lid on overt outbursts/displays. Especially the low energy wallowing type. Just brooding alone. Depressed.
The cool, calm, and collected is a compartmentalization. A facade. A mask covering what is hidden within. Covering what H is running from. All those demons that come out to play when he lays still in bed in the dark of night.
Originally Posted by Whatlee
I would say that he just doesn’t love me anymore and truly doesn't want to be married.
It’s perfectly normal for you to question if H has MLC or not. Most folks around us, have absolutely no idea what MLC truly is, nor how horrible it is. We LBS often do some second guessing along our journey. With a shortage of witnesses to BD and H’s behaviours, and such a long time dim/dark, of course one starts to question.
Something I’ve often seen is binary thinking. Regarding this particular crux and other key points along an LBS path. It need not be “does H just not love me anymore” or “is it MLC”? It’s both.
A huge part of the crisis is H losing himself. His present day self. The time travel stuff, H reliving his younger years he feels he lost out on. The drinking, smoking pot, 2cell phones, etc. All those non-rational emotionally driven running behaviours.
With H acting, behaving, heck being a teenager, his love for you and his marriage gets muted. Buried. Remember, H is running and making decisions basically on emotions not intellect. Couple that with depression and you get mostly negative absolutes about things and events. As an example: H telling you that he will never feel in love with you again.
Negative absolutes are indicative of deep depression. Prognostications that they will never ever (fill in the blank), feel very real and feel like forever while embroiled in depression. Heck, I felt such things too. Eventually (hopefully) depression lifts and those depressive emotions fade and disappear.
Differing viewpoints. H is depressed and feels it is over. And you know better.
However, H cannot hear you. I mean, he really cannot fathom that his topsy turvy world is wrong. You could argue with him until blue in the face and he will not get it. He is lost in his crisis. And he needs to walk his path.
And boy oh boy, MLCers are so slow!
Remember, marathon not a sprint.
Somewhere, deep inside H, is his love for you. Sometimes we even get glimpses of our “old” spouse before the pod-person took them over.
Every MLCer is different, and every crisis is different, because every person is different. There are certainly some common crisis/MLCer traits, yet H is an individual and his crisis will be how it is due to who he is. Most posters bring the wild and crazy situations here more than the mask wearing moments. With questioning, comparing, and such, one can loose sight of the forest for the trees.
Like I said, I think you are dealing with MLC.
However, that being said, you deal with it by not dealing with it. You deal with things you can control. Focusing on you. Moving forward. Letting go. And so on.
I do understand and empathize that H’s current divorce push is stirring stuff up within you. (((Hugs))) Perfectly normal. Allow yourself to settle and you’ll find your center again.
Hang in there girl!
D
Feelings are fleeting. Be better, not bitter. Love the person, forgive the sin.
