No, a LOT bit defensive...and without spell checking so beware...lol.
Quote: I thinkthe most important thing you can focus on is how to set meaningful boundaries without viewing them as an attack or ultimatum or whatever against another person. I see in your posts about your own sitch and to others that you are very reluctant to set clear boundaries about what you are and are not willing to accept in your interactions with others.
I don't understand this. What would I be setting a boundary "against"? Do you mean I set a boundary that I am unwilling to live in a sexless marriage and if my W is not going to participate in solving that issue NOW, that I consider that reason to walk away, or just put EVERYTHING else on hold until that becomes part of the equation?
I KNOW that there are some people, I even think PM was one place I read this, that think that being friends can actually HURT a marriage but this is one place where, even if it kills my chances of being married to this woman, or any other, I am going to make up my own mind. I see what we are doing now as building towards something, something MORE passionate, certainly more open, and more long-lasting.
Again, I don' really know what the boundary would be in this case. It was clear when the affair was going on what boundaries I could and should set, but not now.
Please help with this,
Quote: Of course there are better and worse times for things. Clearly, pursuing a romantic R with W when she was out of the M would be inappropriate. Only you can tell if the stress of the DUI problem (which you are curiously minimizing right now, but sounds like it is really a symptom of your W's longstanding pattern of using alcohol to cope with her unhappiness) is making this a bad time. A couple of weeks isn't going to make a difference.
I agree and disagree. I DO think this DUI stress and how W is handling it may be a continuation of her ongoing issue with alcohol but I disagree that a couple days/weeks won't make a difference. That amount of time has made GREAT amounts of difference in the recent past and I have no doubt that it CAN now. I guess I just don't see the need for hurrying. If my W is going to leave me this week because I don't DO something, then let her go. If it is SO fragile as to not last another week (or two as you say) then I am VERY wrong about where things stand and I will throw my hands up and give up. I don't think I am wrong.
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However, the emotional coddling is more of the same from you. What will be different is if you stop it in a few weeks as you suggested.
What does this mean. Again, I am genuinely confused. Does this mean worrying about how she will emotionally react to something I say or do?
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I emotionally coddled my XH for years and it did no one any good. He probably felt emasculated. I would expect your W also feels not much like a real woman with you. Her OM probably treated her as a strong passionate independent woman and dealt with her as an adult who could handle things with little BS.
Ok, which came first, the chicken or the egg? I STRONGLY suspect that she BEHAVED like a strong, passionate independent woman with him and handled her "BS" around me. She said as much. She was NOT being open and honest with him and hid a LOT about herself from him because it made it easier that way.
So, yes, she may feel like "less" of a woman with me but she acts like less of one too. Do I simply stop being there for her when she asks me to be? Because she always ASKS me to be, I don't just hover around, waiting to be needed.
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Your W has told you over and over again that she prefers you to be direct. You get better results when you are direct. Yet, you aren't on this issue. I doubt that OM had much of a problem telling her what he wanted sexually and eventually what he would require to continue the A, even while she was saying NO to him and protesting.
Ok, I'll leave my eariler boundary question but I guess this addresses it. I HAVE been direct, just not in the last couple weeks. I HAVE told her that things need to be different than before. I HAVE told her I want/need more than even what we had before all this. I have told her more than once. Why beat the dead horse some more. I feel like I am CRYSTAL clear about what I want, both in my words and in my actions. I feel like I need to know where her head is at right now because since I think I am being pretty direct with her, she is not doing any such thing with me. Maybe that's another thing that needs to be a boundary for me, but then again, boundary is a weird term for that, maybe something I ask her for...I don't know.
Quote: She has even told you that she despises the status quo.
Yes. Actually I TOLD her this first and she agreed. That opened her up to telling me she was unhappy about the "quo", status or otherwise.
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Has she told you that she doesn't want to address this for a few weeks?
Well, the last time I suggested talking about it she said "not right now" and has said that she wishes all this "stuff" wasn't happening right now because there were "other" things, I assume but should have asked I guess, that she wanted to be thinking about and working on. She DID ask for more time, yes.
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Has she told you that living in a sexless M makes her life less stressful?
No, but revisiting our sex life for the first time after 8 months and possible a PA which I think she would still want to admit to before ML with me would be VERY stressful I think. That seems to be a no-brainer to me but then again, I am not really sure of much these days.
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Have you shared with her your feelings? What you want? What you are willing to accept? What your actions will be in different scenarios? Do you know your own boundaries here at all?
Yes, I have shared my feelings, but as I said, not for a couple weeks. She knows what I want, and she KNOWS I will not accept this going on forever. Maybe she doesn't KNOW it as much as I'd like because I have not really done anything about it, like leave or cut off all contact with her, but she has heard it from me. She knows this is not something I want to do forever.
What different scenarios? Another week without kissing? Another month without sex? I don't feel scenarios like that REQUIRE action. Why all the emphsis on the time-frame? I don't get that at all. I am still seeing progress and I guess because of that, I think my current actions are working to a certain degree. I guess you disagree.
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My suggestion is to continue to read PM and to talk to your C.
I am planning to do both. Like I said, PM is loosing me a bit right now because it is getting into specific sexual things that may be GREAT groundwork for a future sex life with my W, but right now, I am looking for more "relationship" things.
I will cast aside my reluctance to reading right now because I fully accept that what I am reading now CAN help so back I go...
As for C, I can't see her for another couple weeks
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BTW, I think your W is well aware that there is a problem with sex in your M and is not happy with it. Perhaps she would read PM with you. You are the one choosing to try to manage the whole problem on your own without sharing in it with your W as a romantic P.
OT, not to blame you or anything, because I KNOW I am the one making the decisions here, but you are the one who preached to me for so long to "not be in the R" any more than my W. To me, that is what I am doing. To me, we are NOT in a romantic R. To me, I am courting my W to GET her into a romatic R with me. Until she reciprocates, I will not consider it any more than a "rebuilding" phase.
As I said before, that does NOT mean I will not talk to her. Actually, I think I NEED to talk to her to, as you say "share it with her" but not as a current romantic partner, but a former one who I am trying to reconnect with.
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How far do you think you would have gotten without the bomb? Your W hasn't gotten the bomb and your continued acceptance of the status quo and emotional coddling actively contributes to her staying stuck. Your reluctance to explore, define, and maintain your own boundaries is keeping you stuck.
Point WELL taken, but I do think W has had a mini-bomb of a differnt sort when her A went bad and OM didn't fix "her" problems. I think she now knows that there is work that CAN be done with us.
Back to your original question, I don't think I would have gotten far at all, actually I DIDN't get very far in our entire marriage so...
Yes, I may be stuck, but I won't be for long. I am just having a terrible time adjusting to this new way of thinking concerning an issue (intimacy) that may have been, may BE the biggest one of our marriage. I will think a lot about what you are saying.
Quote: Do you know what? Your M might not work out. Your W might never turn into the romantic P that you want. Or, things might work out. Your W might become the full participant and partner in your M that you want. You can either figure out which way things will go or you can stay stuck in an empty life until your W determines which way they will go.
Choose to act from integrity rather than fear.
I think I am acting from integrity. I just think I don't know the right things to do and thus are acting out of ignorance as well. As I am learning, I am trying to weave these new things into my outlook. It's VERY hard going but I think I am getting there.
OT, I am truly sorry for being defensive. It's just hard to hear that you are not doing enough when you think you are giving all you have and then some. I AM trying, and I AM going to do what I have to do. I think more than my W, I NEED time to process all this and DO what I need to do. Maybe THAT'S the real truth.
