Ive been very quietly fuming over here Typical man
He handed you a lot of power when he said he isnt leaving again. Whatchagonnadowithit? I got your point but I still feel pretty powerless sometimes, probably more over my own response than anything else. Why can't I just will myself to "get over it"?
Your indecision is killing you. Yes. As well as my pride, my self respect, my stubbornness...
You are not a consolation prize. Thats such a negative attribution and self defeating. Not very confidant either.
Oh, I know I'm not a consolation prize. I'm a catch! You and I are very similar in several areas BF. Both emotional, stubborn, and a little too egocentric. I understand why you sabotaged the reconciliation with your W. (and you did when you went off on her). You knew it would cause major damage and you did it anyways. Sometimes I do the same. Why? Part of me thinks, how dare he? I'm an attractive, bright, fun woman who also loves to have sex! Most guy's would be thrilled to be with me. But like you said, SO? M is not about attractiveness but commitment, trust, respect, etc He says he is now committed to me, he respects me, but neither one of us really trusts the other. I guess that will just take time to build.
He was overwhelmed and needed to escape to his cave. for reasons that you were a part of. Have you figured your part of it out yet? Yes, and it is a continual process of self-discovery. I am not the same person I was before the separation. That woman would not be saying she is a "catch" and acting like she deserves better. But I do feel that way which is also part of the problem. I think I always looked down on those women who seemed to just take their H's back after some betrayal and thought, where is her self respect, her self-esteem? I would never be like that. Well, here I am living it. Can't tell you how many women made comments to me about how they would have never taken my H back. How is that supposed to make me feel? And it's not other people's comments, its my own. How can I respect myself if I let him come back? I want to feel good about myself around my H, not bad. And sometimes, I do feel bad. My guess BF is that you were doing some of the same. Can you live with yourself, hold on to your self-esteem and respect, if you take back your W who slept with your friend? Hard pill to swallow and keep down. Are you externally observing (others faults) or internal (yours)
I am doing both to an insane degree. Over-analyzing his every word and action. Doing the same to myself. Can't seem to take it down a notch. Need to work on that. It just goes so far against my nature.
If you use this new found power to belittle, berate and deflate him, verbally or mentally, you will end up back where you were, or worse.
I am not doing this verbally (anymore) but I think it in my head. Running dialogue all day and night. I feel guilty about it at times which I guess is good. Didn't have that guilt a while ago.
Your mind will believe whatever you repeatedly think about, and tell it. What are you thinking about?
Guess I sort of just answered that. Too many negatives, whether about him or the R. Also doing too many "what ifs". What if I left? What if we never got back together? Would I get remarried? Would I be happy? Would I be having amazing sex right now? See, most M women don't "go there" in their thoughts. They feel committed to the M and live within that boundary. My boundaries are really blurry. And frankly, the excitement of that unknown future is what I miss the most about our reconciliation. I'm a little jealous of you BF.
Me? I think I'm incredible attractive. See it works. Yeah, well, I need to stay away from feeling too attractive. It's much safer when you are single BF. I'm sure you attract the women like flies to the honey. And, you don't have to resist them now. Saw that hot 25-ish boy at the gym again this morning. He was looking at me again too. I behaved myself and walked out right after I was done in my class. Tempted to say hi though. Stupid. I don't need the validation but I like it. I needed it horribly when H left. Just need to get out of bad patterns.
You and your H need a game plan. Winging it is not working. Uuhhmmmmmm....stay away from 25ish boys? Yes, I know we need a game plan. He wants to go back to MC soon. Might be necessary but I need to embrace the concept first. I want to go into it with determination to really try. Not all half-assed. Otherwise, its money down the drain.
I understand the paradigm you find yourself in. I think most of us probably think we would react a certain way in certain situations...but when faced with reality we find, it's not so simple.
I want to say something to you though.....when those women ask you how you can take your H back, ask them if they've ever been in your shoes. Stop worrying about what other people will think or how they will perceive you....cut yourself some slack too. You have absolute power now to drop your previous perception of women who do take their H's back...you now know your assumed perception of these women was off-base. You respect yourself, you value yourself....but you value your M too, you value your H...and that's why people take each other back, not to mention they love each other much of the time.
So YOU are the one not letting yourself respect who you are for taking your H back because you are holding onto a misperception of who you thought those women were whose shoes you are now filling. You now hold the key to letting that go.....so do it.
Here's a thought....when you start thinking those negative thoughts, conciously think of a positive one too. You are going to have to start literally training your brain to do this....it's a very concious thing to learn right now. It's something my H has been having to train himself to do....and I can see a BIG difference.
Hang in there....give this TIME. You and your H have both been through emotional hell over the last several months, it's going to take time to regain trust and your EC, don't let the speedbumps throw you off course.
an IV chicken soup ( or maybe chocolate) drip. Oooh, chocolate directly into the veins. On second thought, no, I like the slippery yummy feel of it on my tongue. It's very sensual. No wonder I like it
You both are going to have to come together to make something entirely new, and it begins by committing to the process. H is getting there...and so are you. Truer words never spoken. It has to be entirely new. I think I still need to kill the old ways though. I can't commit until I get a sense that it will work and maybe it won't work until I commit Ironically, I think H is now ahead of me in the commitment department. Not that I am going anywhere but my mind is out to lunch half the time. Blech.
The board here is filled with emotional HD women and their LD closed off men That's for sure. Drats. Not a good combo at times but some people seem to really make it work. You start to join together and see each other's stengths rather than live in separate worlds. I REALLY need to work on this one. Thanks for reminding me. if you get a chance read over some of the stories in the MLC forum Haven't been over there in a while. I'll check it out. Could use some inspiration. Thanks IHJ!
I missed your posts on the board the past few weeks. Glad things are going well for you
So YOU are the one not letting yourself respect who you are for taking your H back because you are holding onto a misperception of who you thought those women were whose shoes you are now filling. You now hold the key to letting that go.....so do it.
I know I hold the key to getting over my misperceptions. I am an intelligent person. Can reason it out no problem. The reasonable/rational side of me is overpowered by the emotional side right now (well, probably most of the time ) I don't want to be able to just SAY I am right but I want to FEEL like I am right. "It is right to take H back and make the M work." Sure, makes sense, but if my feelings are all over the place, I can't make my cognitions match up. You are going to have to start literally training your brain to do this....it's a very concious thing to learn right now YES. And it is going to take all of my willpower. Lots of work. Gotta psyche myself up for it. Right now, I'm still a little in the "poor me" phase. The sense of entitlement phase. I really need to break through that barrier.
You certainly don't have to tell me your an intelligent person, I know that already I also know what it's like to rationally know what you need to do, but emotionally conflict with that....that's pretty much what I'm pulling out of right now, it's not a pleasant place to be, I hated it! I'm a logical person...like you I over-analyze everything.
You may just simply be in a spot right now where you, like I said, need to cut yourself some slack....and concentrate on conciously changing some of your behaviors. Being a logical/rational person like you, it helps me to have something I can do that's tangible....perhaps instead of just thinking about positives in your R, you could make a concious effort to actually write 3 positives a day in a journal? Just a suggestion, but it's things like that that help me out. It's something to help you work through that "knowing your doing the right thing" until you two get to a place where you "feel" it as well and rebuild some of that trust and EC you two need.
I think you are expecting too much too soon as far as your R goes. I do however absolutely agree with something you said, I don't see how your R will improve until you fully commit.
About a year ago or so...I thought I was committed to my M, I really did. One day though, I found myself surfing the internet looking up rental properties, just curious what a decent 2-bdrm house would rent for in my area (at least I thought it was just curiosity) it dawned on me as I kept scoping out the neighborhoods on my way home that evening....that I was looking for potential homes for my son and I, because my H was nowhere in my thoughts as far as the houses went. I was mentally mulling over my "escape" plan so-to-speak, so how could I possibly be fully committed to my M? Even though we were seeing a MC, and I was continually talking, communicating, etc. I realized I wasn't committed, I was looking at plan B. Knowing myself the way I do, I also realized that once I start thinking about something, it's merely a matter of time before I take action.
So...what'd I do? I went home and told my H what I realized....I also told him though that I don't want to move out, had no plans to do so. I want "us" to work....and re-committed verbally to him that I want our M to work. I haven't looked at rental property since then...for me it's not an option, not at this time....not while I'm seeing some type of progress in the direction I need. To be honest too....I've seen the most progress in our M since that time too, primarily in the last six months. We've certainly had our ups & downs, but there has been progress regardless.
One thing I meant to add, but forgot. I truly believe my H felt I was on the verge of leaving when I was looking at properties....even though he didn't know I was doing it, he still felt I had one foot out the door...even though I didn't really see it at the time myself. I firmly believe, especially looking back in retrospect now, that because he felt this from me (even though he had no intentions of going anywhere) that it kept him from really committing to working on things too. It wasn't until after our conversation and my verbal recommitment to us that I really started seeing improvements in his behavior toward me....true it wasn't sexual in nature. But he really began making efforts not to treat me as though I was his X.
Thanks for sharing that story GEL. Commitment is a funny thing. I think in some M that word gives people permission to slack off on the R. Why really work on something that is so difficult when you know darn well that person isn't going anywhere. While other people really need that level of commitment to jump start the improvement process. With my H, I do not trust his words or his emotions. I recall very vividly the few days before he left. He had the apartment already purchased. Was out. Yet, talked to me like not a thing was wrong. Acting perfectly "normal" other than the ongoing depression that was lingering for the months before. But he is not me. I would have been making darn sure he knew how I felt and that I was out the door because of it. But not him. So the long history of conflict avoidance makes me very gun shy with trusting him. We have a long road ahead of us in that department.
HP and GEL I'm honestly not sure if there is anything H can say or do right now to make me fully trust him. I think I need to see a steady progression of less conflict avoidance first of all. I am seeing some of that so there is progress. If he continues to conflict avoid, I can only assume what he says and what emotions he expresses are not genuine. So no matter how much he seems to be professing commitment and love right now, it is taken in stride. Heard the I love yous right up to D-Day and frankly all the time after as well. Crazy. Even during the separation he professed to love me, it was all about him, blah blah. So that is what comes to mind. If you have other ideas please share.
Ironically, I think H is now ahead of me in the commitment department. Not that I am going anywhere but my mind is out to lunch half the time. Blech. 
) 
I also know what it's like to rationally know what you need to do, but emotionally conflict with that....that's pretty much what I'm pulling out of right now, it's not a pleasant place to be, I hated it! I'm a logical person...like you I over-analyze everything.