I AM MOVING ON FROM H & OW

[Burgbud]

Hey KDU! How are you feeling now? Maybe a little sheepish but hopefully still strong? If you're worried whether you did the right thing for your R that's understandable, but I'm guessing you continue to feel that you did the right thing for you . And that is what this whole thing has got to be about. When I read your post this stood out to me: ...I regret that I possibly never let my H know how much he meant to me and how much I may have taken him forgranted until all of this happended . So now you certainly have that burden off your mind. You've done everything you could to tell him how you feel and you've shown him you're willing to take action to change the circumstances of your R. He responded inside to some level or, as you say, he would have stopped you in your tracks.

I think you have to work really hard now to leave the ball in his court. Start by forgiving yourself for your part in this mess. There's a sig around here that says something like "Forgiveness is when you stop trying to create an ideal past". This is something I have to work very hard at myself and haven't done a good job of so far. But two things have helped me think about this a little more clearly. One is something I've read a few times on these boards: you're only 100% responsible for your 50% of the R. So you may not have always done the best thing, but you didn't do everything in getting your M to where it is now. The other thing was something an internet friend of mine, who's a Methodist pastor, wrote me. He was talking about her infidelity and he said something very like, "You may have been selfish and even willfully neglectful, but this isn't how adults handle things."

So forgive yourself. You deserve to let go of a lot of guilt. We both may have screwed some things up in our Ms, but we've been busting our butts ever since to make things right. If willpower and belief were all it took to rebuild our Rs all of us around here would have been out of this mess a long time ago. But as you and I have certainly learned the hard way, we can't control another person. Even with what we deeply believe is the truth. So at some point the responsibility for our broken M is at least as much theirs as ours. We can forgive them for what they've done because we see failings in ourselves that put them on their current path. But can't we also forgive ourselves when we see the failings on their part that keep our Ms from healing?

Some of what you've written really concerns me:

I have been desperately unhappy for the last 6 months and I have tried and tried to get over all this and try and have a life without you but I can't.

My mother sat me down and said "Kim I am very worried about you, I have never ever seen you this unhappy, it is affecting your health, your kids and every other relationship in your life.

First of all, you CAN have a life without him. Maybe just not right now. But you CAN and don't let anybody tell you different.

I'm not going to preach to you here about GAL and being happy with yourself because you've read these boards long enough to know how important those things are. But I want you to consider something I've definitely come to believe is true through this ordeal: it's hard for people to be with someone who needs them in order to be happy. Maybe especially for men, who generally seem to be a little more selfish than women. (...a "little" more selfish? I wonder if the ladies will let me get away with that? ) I know this played a role in my increasing neglect for my wife's feelings. And it's one of the reasons that pursuing and especially begging don't work well. And most of all it isn't good for YOU.

Dang, I did start preaching, didn't I?

Anyway, I have a suggestion for you to consider. How about, whether or not H agrees to come home and try again, you ask your mom to take the kids for a month or two? Since you live so close you could still get your fill of their love, but you'd also have time alone to work on yourself. Maybe you need to cry harder and longer than you allow yourself to around them. If so, take a week and really CRY! Cry long, hard and often! Get it all out there. Tell your subconscious now you are dealing with your hurt feelings and your guilt and your sadness and your fear and so it's time for the subconscious to quit making you feel anxious and scared and miserable and guilty. Because you see what the problems are and you're dealing with them yourself; you don't need any more painful prodding from the back of your mind. See if you don't start feeling better after a week or two. If you don't, find a counsellor if at all possible. Or at least go to your mum's and ask her to tell you everything about yourself that's great.

Hopefully your melancholy can turn into sadness can turn into just missing H, and your need for him can turn into desire for him. I desire to eat a good dinner tonight and I'll be hungry and grouchy if I don't, but I don't need to eat dinner tonight.

This could also give you the opportunity to amend your offer a little bit. Maybe make one exception to your no contact rule. Tell H that you've decided you need the time to yourself whether he comes back to try or not. You've got some changes to make and you hope the two of you can begin making them together, but you're going to get started now. Would your mom be willing to take the kids again in the future if he decided to make the attempt in few months instead of a few weeks? It's probably a lot to ask of her but she seems to have a big heart and probably feels really good being able to help when you need it so much. And if she can, you can tell H he has a little longer to think about things, but the offer will still be open.

The more I look at it the more I think you've taken the first step to getting yourself on solid footing. You've said what you had to say in no uncertain terms and you can let yourself off the hook for that. He knows where you stand and how you feel and how much work you're willing to do. Now that ball is in his court. In your court is letting go of some bad feelings and starting to have more fun. Let mom worry about the kids (they're big kids anyway, they won't mind looking out for themselves a little bit) and you start worrying about you. Take your time for yourself to rend garments and gnash your teeth for awhile if you have to; get it all out! Then read novels or comic books or rent gladiator movies or learn how to hula. Don't pressure yourself to feel great, just get a little better every day. Well, more likely you'll be a lot better one day and a little worse the next; we all know how that goes.

The bottom line is if you're strong enough to have made it so long through this heartbreaking sitch, you're strong enough to make yourself happy, and you know that. If you ever forget ask somebody around here because we know it too and we're not afraid to remind you.