Need Advice on How to Move On

[Burgbud]

Wow, Sheila, you're in such a philosophically interesting and confusing place. Is love a verb? Is it *just* a verb? One person's changes will change the other person, but will it change them enough? Where's the line between a partner's flaws that are dealbreakers and flaws that we can accept and love them with? What qualities or attitudes are actually absolutely necessary for a successful, loving R? And of course, how much of what we want and value are we willing to give up in our R?

Do you think H is happy with himself? He seems insecure about your R. Do you think that stems from personal insecurities or from concern about *your* willingness to keep working on the R?

It almost seems to me like you've gotten to a place that I always wonder about in almost everybody's case on this board. So many people are giving an incredible amount to their R and receiving much less, or in some cases almost nothing, in return. How long can that continue? Isn't that the very problem that causes so many walkaways in the first place? That one person is working to meet the emotional needs of the other without getting their emotional needs met in return? (Speaking of emotional needs, has H read the 5LL?) And your sitch shows that emotional needs aren't the only thing that can go wrong in an R. There are practical needs as well.

Your idea of him checking the boxes to make you happy struck a chord with me. I used to do that with W, especially in bed. I think we tend to do that when we're afraid to fail. We're scared to be in the moment with our partner because we might screw something up and that will really be bad; to have let our feelings touch our partner's and yet still have done the wrong thing. Doesn't that mean we're not right for each other? Better to go through the list that we've seen work in the past. That way our feelings don't mislead us.

I can also tell you that his discomfort at you being on the internet comes strictly from his insecurity. He's not confident that he's a man capable of attracting you to a permanent R. So he falls back to a little bit of control, maybe that will work better.

Will he read a book if you ask him to? I would definitely recommend _Wild at Heart_ by John Eldrege. It's a book about men from a Christian perspective and might be just what he needs if he'll buy in a little bit. It was probably the 2nd most important book in my turnaround after Bonds.

Good luck! It's better to have the funk than to be in a funk.