Quote: I think you were right not to confront at night. I know whenever I say aynthing at night it escalates into something bad fast. I have to have the right timing.
Timing AND place are indeed very important. If you find that most of your arguments take place late at night and in the living room, then maybe it's best not to start a "talk" there and then. It's kinda like the old joke "Hey Doc, my arm hurts when I bend it this way...Well, said Doc, then don't bend your arm that way."
Quote: It is just another way he is showing me he disrespcts me. I have to get that. If he respected me, he would not be having an affair.
Wrong. He doesn't care what you think or say. It's not the same thing as disrespect. Saying it's disrespectful is akin to saying the affair is about you in some way, and sadly, it's not. Most of the time, whether they show it or now, the WAS's are not all that happy to be hurting you but they are very happy to finally be doing something that feels good to them. To use your drug use analogy, it's like saying that the person you love who is a drug addict doesn't respect you or else they'd quit the drugs.
I fully realize that you COULD look at it as a respect thing, and that's your choice, but DB steers us away from that line of thought because it's not accurate in most cases and it's counterproductive to DBing in general.
This affair is all about your H, period, and that's one of the hardest things for us to understand. We WANT them to be conflicted all the time about what they're doing to us. We WANT them to be in pain like we are.
Respect or lack thereof for you has very little to do with it. Now, respect for himself, and personal integrity is another story.
Quote: I have to get strong enough to let him know I am worthy of respect and if he cannot give that to me, than he will have to stay away until he thinks he can try.
That is your choice, as is making this all about respect. Whether either of those things works to bring him back is unknown at this point. Setting boundaries and enforcing them is always good I think, but sometimes we have to understand that certain boundaries are likely to push them away rather than help them grow closer. This one MAY do either, who knows. Right now, your H doesn't want to give anything to you so this boundary, this ultimatum may backfire if you are trying to get him back. If you need to do this for your own self-respect, then maybe it will work.
I find, starting with myself, and looking at many people here, that we put WAY too much value in their respect for us and use that as a substitute for our own respect for ourselves. When we feel their respect has been taken away, we feel no respect for ourselves, as if we "let" them disrespect us when the truth is that they are their own people and since we don't control them, we don't "let" them do anything, they make that choice on their own.
To me, there IS a fine line here but personally, I define that line like this, others may have a different line. IF my W said to me "I'm having affair and you can't do anything about it. I am going to f--k this guy in our bed and it would be nice if you were not here, but if you are, then fine, try to stay downstairs. Oh, and BTW, since you're still going to be around, please take my laundry to the cleaners, wash my car and have dinner ready for us at around 7:00 because our afternoon f--k should be done by then. Thanks' hon for being a good sport."
THAT would be disrespect. That kind of thing, blatent throwing it in my face, making SURE I know everything that's going on, and then expecting me to just sit there and take it is crossing the line. Maybe I'm arguing semantics to you, but my point is that MOST WAS don't do anything close to that. They sneak around, lie, try to fool us, etc, because on some level, they know what they're doing is wrong. On SOME level they may respect us but that doesn't translate into loving actions.
Last thing on this. I can respect my enemy in war but that doesn't mean I don't want to kill him. I think you're mistaking the word respect for love.
Quote: However, in the mean time, if he does not respect me, we will get no where. me being nice and doing everything is giving him no consequences at all for his behaviors. It is like having our teenager doing drugs and me sitting back trying to be nice to him while he figures out it is a bad thing. No, someone needs to step in and give some tough love.
Is that somewhere in DB or DR? I doubt it. Maybe it looks like we're just sitting back, enjoying the ride, but that's not the case. First of all, the drug using teenager is, well a teenager, not a grown man capable of making his own decisions. We are still responsible for the teenagers in our homes and therefore, as we often have to do with children under our care, we have to correct their behaviors, discipline them. Your H is not a child, and you are not his mother. You can't scold him into behaving as you want him to. He is making decisions that HE feels are right for him and I don't know how much impact "tough" love is going to have on him if he doesn't really care much about what you think. IF he was that concerned with your love, he would not likely be doing what he's doing. NOW, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying there is no hope, but if you make this into a power struggle, with your needs/desires on one end and his on the other, it's very possible that he'll choose his over yours and walk. Again, if you need to force that outcome, one way or another for your sake, then fine, but be prepared for the BOTH possibilities.
DB/DR does (I think, been awhile) talk about that. Ultimatums are usually bad because most of the time they're done to try to force the WAS back and the LBS is ill prepared to deal with it backfiring.
You ARE worthy of respect, but it has to start with SELF-respect and that has little to do with him or anyone else. It has to do with the confidence to make your own decisions and live with them.
As I ALWAYS say, too much really because it sounds like a cop-out or defensiveness, there are MANY ways to go about this, but DB/DR set forth a pretty unique approach that works well for some, and is damn near impossible for others. It is seen by some as a powerful set of ACTIONS to bring about personal and relationship change, and others as too passive and all about losing self-respect as the WAS walks all over you. It can be either depending on how you implement it, and how much you buy into the ideas you read about.
