Quote: Please stop pursuing him. You are only pushing him away further. Stop it. Immediately. As hard it is, try your best to ignore the OW's presence. She is not the reason your M is in trouble. She may add to the confusion right now, but the problems were there before she came into the picture.
This was from a post by NM to Mama's thread. I just felt the need to respond to this basic tenant to DBing and really a lot of other approaches to infidelity.
I believe this is true in the beginning. I believe it is true that the problems that led to the affair are the real issues to be tackled, but the case of Mama, PArob, Tim, Frank (well, in the past) and others who have had their bombs reinforced by the fact that their spouse refused to give up the A even after it came to light are different. Right now, the OM in my sitch IS the problem. My W and I have really never gotten along better and I believe it is genuine, not one or the other of us sugar coating things. We still argue and have our moments, but since we are more open and since I have taken responsibility for my happiness and NOT put that responsibility on her anymore, things are much less tense and just, well, better. I really believe that if the OM was out of the picture that we would have a fighting chance, but so long as he is in the picture, we are stuck dealing with that. My W even admits this now. So, when I see this advice to ignore the OM/OW and that they are not the real problem, I react on two levels. On one level I think it's important to recognize that as truth so we as LBS get with the program and start to make our changes that will make us the true person we are, and probably start addressing the issues that cause problems in our M's. On the other level, I think it's crap because in time, all other things improving with any luck at all due to DB or whatever, then the OM IS THE ISSUE, plain and simple. Until our spouses extracate them from their lives, it will remain the over-riding issue that prevents us from moving forward.
Sorry for the rant...now back to our regularly scheduled programing...
