Your questions are interesting: "are the changes in ourselves noticable and enduring enough to break down whatever the barrier is to successful reconciliation? Have we done the things that would allow love of us to overcome these barriers? Have we even done enough to help them come to love us again?"
I dont think we can do anything to influence them. They have to go through the process of self-work and discover that which is deep within them. Meanwhile we have the opportunity afforded by the break in the marriage to do self-work on us. To examine what within us gave rise to the conditions under which our WAW's left. Nobody is or can be perfect. But there may be some key elements of who we are now that needs to be tackled and changed. And typically the WAW points this out correctly as one of our problems (except they exaggerate even small problems as insurmountable). We cannot engineer the return of the WAW, we can only make ourselves attractive through addressing our own issues.
Perhaps this is a good time and place to confess my own insights into what I did wrong. This is based on my WAW's telling me in the period prior to separation and from my own reading and reflection:
1. I had become less of a man. I was not managing myself independently and had become somewhat dependent on her. (WAW said this and it is true). 2. I needed to stand up for myself and exhibit some confidence. I had let personality-building go as I had gotten complacent after marriage. (WAW said this and it is true). 3. I acted like I could not manage my life without her. Bad idea. (Deida points out the danger in this). 4. I had lost self-confidence and that made me try to control her. (my own self-examination). 5. I had gotten so busy with work that I had neglected hobbies and GAL activities that made me feel whole just for myself. 6. I had become neglectful of my spiritual strengthening.
So, in some ways, due to various reasons I had become a diluted human being, lacking inner strength and direction. I had become world-weary and unable to project an image of self-assurance. This was transmitted to my W. Deida is spot-on about predicting the dire consequences of this dynamic. She became weary and it triggered her loss of way. She figured the only way out was "external divorce" as opposed to "internal divorce" (this is a term that Peter O'Conner uses. He says the way to rejuvenate a marriage during one spouse's MLC is by an internal divorce, i.e. get rid of the old marriage and forge a new one within the R, dont go for a fresh brand-new R with someone else, which would be an external divorce). I am addressing each of these shortcomings of mine. Some I am doing better at than others. But in any case I will fix these holes in me and I will be better as a man and person.
The key is I cannot make my WAW complete or happy unless deep down I am complete and happy with myself.
UD
The 3 laws of DBing:
1. PMA is critical to DBing.
2. Since drop in WAW's PMA leads to drop in LBS's PMA and vice-versa detachment is critical.
3. Validate to raise WAW's PMA and GAL to raise LBS's.
