Jenny - Thanks for your kind words. I love my W deeply as a person, and every effort I've made is well worth it for her, for me, and for us. I TOTALLY agree with you about keeping up the DB'ing, and not slipping back into old patterns. I've really found that some of the situations we encounter may not have changed, but they way I react to them has, which makes all the difference in the world. If some of the same things that are happening now happened a year ago, I'm not sure what I would have done and where we'd be. My W does feel fortunate, has told me so, but the problem now is she feels unworthy of the kindness I've shown, and how I treat her. A lot of self-esteem issues on her part, trying to work through them daily, together.
Kent - You are SOOO greedy!! I'm just trying to give you a hand, buddy! There's some pretty awesome "wimmens" here, probably more than any one man could handle! Thanks for your welcome. It feels good to finally be here.
Heidi - Sounds like you're doing great, too! You don't sound like a newcomer, think it IS time for you to move here also! The physical part returning to your relationship is something that shouldn't be rushed or forced. Too much too soon can ruin the whole thing. It might be like the difference between just having sex and making love. The time must be right, not planned or expected, and not forced. For us, it just happened last night, in the middle of watching a movie by ourselves. We were spending time relaxing, and laughing hysterically at parts of the movie. Neither of us planned on it or expected it, which added a lot of passion to it. (I'll stop there for now, thank you!) From talking and listening to my W, there is a tremendous amount of guilt and shame inside her about the affair, and it's going to take a lot for her to work through it. There's some things about it we can work on together, but there's a lot she needs to feel on her own. Re the separate bed deal, we, too, spent the first few nights in the same bed. It was comforting in a way, but also very uncomfortable, especially for her. In some of my "snooping", I found where she wrote she was scared of being smoothered by our relationship. With this knowledge, I made sure to give her plenty of space. It was her idea about the separate rooms, and I gave her my full understanding on this. She went back and forth on actually "moving out" of "our/my" room, felt kinda bad about it, but I supported her on the decision. She's been back in "my" room for the past 4 nights now, and it looks like she's here to stay. "Her" room is still there when she needs it. If it were me, I would offer the separate bedroom option to your H. Be sure to let him know that you just want him to be comfortable. Give him the room and space to grow, and the time to catch up to you. You've come a long way to get to where you are now.
[This message has been edited by Jamesjohn (edited 05-10-2001).]
JJ
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