How to GAL when SP is jealous/trust is broken??

[heatherg]

NY~

We're all doing whatever to attract our WASs back, and yours insists on making it difficult.

I've thought that many times as I've read through the posts on these BBs, that these people really want their spouses back even though they've been deeply hurt. I've wondered many times what my H expects of me.
He has a very strong sense of right and wrong and pretty much all who know him agree that things are black and white and there is no gray. Even if/as things improve, it is hard for me to imagine that I will ever have his full forgiveness.

He could keep on throwing hurdles at you that you need to jump over to continually prove yourself unless he lets it go.

This is what I'm afraid of. He keeps looking for something outside of himself to make him want to forgive me. It's as if he doesn't understand that it has to come from within himself. Meanwhile, I'm afraid I will have to give up my integrity to try to prove something that cannot be proven.

And you're saying that you regret what you've done, but you had your reasons, they were valid to you, and so you don't see yourself beholden or accountable to H for them so as to be sorry to him, specifically?

I'm saying there were reasons. I don't think they were valid reasons for cheating, no. But those reasons are not why it's been difficult to be specifically sorry to H~it's more the way he has treated me and handled the situation. I know it sounds terrible, like I do something awful to someone I'm supposed to love and then give them a flunking grade on how they handle it. But I've felt only anger and defensiveness toward him since I told him about the A, not very conducive to mixing with feelings of sorrow and regret. Does that make sense?
I need to talk more about detaching. My H is awesome at detaching. But clearly it's not the same thing as what DB encourages. My H can just shut me right out if he's angry at me. I think that detaching was such a negative cycle in our M, that ultimately nothing I did could elicit a response from him. I cheated for his attention, I'm pretty sure of that. It was like, "there, I did this. will you listen to me now??" Very immature and irresponsible, especially when two children are involved. I'm not saying I did it consciously, but after a great deal of reflection on why I would do something so uncharacteristic of me, I've come down to the fact that I wanted to get his attention and I wanted him to quit blowing me off.
So, I need to redefine "detaching" because to me, it already has a meaning and it's not a good one.

what's H's expectation of what "sorry" should be or look like coming from you?

I have absolutely NO idea. I've thought about this quite a bit. Is there a difference between being sorry and being sorry TO someone? Because H says he does not doubt that I am sorry. Sorry to myself, our kids, sorry to my family and to his family. But I've never been sorry to HIM. What does that mean???