Congratulations on the breakthough! That was a major hurdle!
Now please remember to take it slow!!! Your journey isn't over yet!
I don't want you to take this post as limiting your joy, I just want you to be CAREFUL! Those of us with WAWs don't have a great success rate at winning back our wives, so we need to make sure we don't stumble when we have them headed in the right direction.
I am in a very similar situation to yourself. I have had that "breakthrough" with my wife a few weeks back. (Although it may not have been quite as spectacular or significant as yours.) She told me she finally believed me when I said the changes I had made were permanent. She promised to re-commit her efforts in our marriage just as much as I had. (Just like your wife said about you, my W had been aware of all the changes I had been making, and needed time to truly believe I meant what I said.)
Now, here's my warning, and again please don't take this as "rain on your parade"
************************************* Don't assume the rollercoaster ride is over. It's never truly over.
Since my breakthrough with my wife, life has been wonderful. We've laughed, we've been intimate, we've both initiated snuggling sessions and we talk all the time... more than we ever have. It's been truly wonderful.
But then one day it dawned on me that she still hadn't told me she loved me yet. At that point I had a "setback", forgetting that since things were headed in the right direction didn't mean things were "back to normal". I made a big No-No and asked her about it. She got upset and said that while she is working very hard on things, she still gets very mad at me at times for the way things were in the past. She said there are times she just doesn't want me around, or want me to love her. She also said that she doesn't know when (or if) that feeling will truly go ever away, which would be a "problem". To top it off, although we've tabled it for the forseeable future (I thought it was totally gone) she mentioned that a separation still may be needed sometime down the road to see what she really wants. She wanted to know if the only reason I wanted her now as compared to "back then" (I've always wanted her, I just didn't know how to show it) was that she lost a ton of weight.
So you see, while I thought I was "out of the woods" or "over the hump", I stumbled upon a whole nest of yet to be resolved issues. I recovered pretty well (I think) and we've resumed our efforts. We continue down our long road to the perfect marriage - we're enjoying this newfound closeness, but I still wait to hear those precious few words.
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Enough negativity for a response to a happy post...
Again, Congratulations Chris!!! We're all so happy for you. Keep the faith, best of luck to you, and heed my warning: Demons can be controlled, but they are never truly gone. With that in mind, you should be set for the remainder of your journey.
