The type of growth you will experience if you successfully work through all of *this* ssm crap will lead you to a point where you don't let your spouse's behavior define anything about you. I've felt this change over the past year and it feels pretty good.

Getting to that point has required some pretty hard work but one of the one things that made huge impact came from the first minute of my first C session.

C: "Do you go by Dave or David?"
Me: "Oh, I don't care".
C: "Why not?"

I've worked very hard at "liking" the person that I am but I've had to spend a lot of time trying to figure out just who "I" am.
Step 1 - "Is this really *me* ?"
Step 2 - "Yes it is...I'm ok with it".
Step 3 - "Hey W, this is who I am"
Step 4 - "Hey world, this is who I am"

As I take various personal attributes through these 4 steps, I'm finding a sense of "inner peace" and it's getting easier as I go. I think this is "differentiation". It's helping me outside the marriage in a big way. I'm perceiving other people in a completely new way and am generally more confident now.

Anywhere is walking distance if you have the time -Steven Wright