You need to process your feeling not hide them. Keeping them inside is not good for you. I am not talking about telling the wife to fix her because she is a grown adult and she will make whatever choices she want to. However find a way to let them out on your own time when you are by yourself so that you do not continue to dwell on them. Focus on yourself and what you can fix not you wife and what you cant fix. This time we all have right now is for self relection and healing. Take it and use it wisely.
Ben 32 STBXW 29 3 kids (D1,S4,SD8) (1 dog 5months) Status: Fighting for the Kids.
"The only thing we know about future developments is that they will develope."
Whatisis, What is going on with you today? Any insightful quotes or knowledge from the book? Just checking in on you. By the way isn't today the next dance lesson?
Ben 32 STBXW 29 3 kids (D1,S4,SD8) (1 dog 5months) Status: Fighting for the Kids.
"The only thing we know about future developments is that they will develope."
I had an interesting coincidence today. Last night my W began to tell me about her work situation (!) and seemed to be looking for validation that what she was doing in the situation at hand was correct. I sat back, listened and supported her concerns and made no suggestions like "you need to..." I did show a bit of supportive anger by saying "How much can they possibly expect you to do?" and stuff like that. No suggestions, no criticism, no expert analysis of the situation. I hope it helped her (and did no harm to my position!). Today on break I opened up my Five Things book and the starting place was "Being With the Suffering of Others", basically how to listen and show empathy , there's alot there to share but I'll go with this: "Empathetic presence means listening to someone's pain with ...attention, acceptance, appreciation, affection, and allowing. We pay attention without being distracted. We accept what is said without editing, adding, or blanking. We feel a genuine caring about what happened and what might happen to this person. We allow whatever feelings or silences or head trips the other employs in this moment without attempting to blame him, stop him, or criticize him."...'Lets just sit beside one another and look at this together. This happened to you. Let me be here with you as we witness this together' I am not the witness of her reality; we are the witnesses of it " Wow, letting go of all those ego layers and just being there with the other person, is often enough. Forget fixing, critiquing, putting a positive spin on it...just be there. What a concept " To stay with ourself or our friend or partner in this way requires that we be free of the need to clear things up or assume control. One person simply accepts the other's truth no matter how unclear, broken, desperate, or fragmented it may be" I know when I listen to my W I want to fix it, show my brilliance, throw in my 2 cents and get on with it! It's best to get back to the basics cuz, guess what, the OP is giving her all the unconditional love and listening she can handle. So I'm glad she shared and that this little chapter was where I started in my reading today. Next part is "When cheer doesn't work", we'll see where that goes. And, yes, OSU, tonite is dance night. My feet are still recovering from last week, who says BR dance is for wooses ! Thanks for checking in everybody.
That book sounds pretty interesting. I might have to pick it up after I get caught up on all of the other books that I have.
By the way, Have fun tonight. Let me know how it goes.
Lastly. That was pretty cool that the W shared her feelings with you. I am still no where near that not to mention live 30 minutes away so she would really have to be deserate to call me and express anything. Glad to hear that you just listened and did not try and fix anything. That is all of our problems as mean when we have a convo with the W. We are always thinking fix it first and actually listen later. Congrats.
Ben 32 STBXW 29 3 kids (D1,S4,SD8) (1 dog 5months) Status: Fighting for the Kids.
"The only thing we know about future developments is that they will develope."
It's break time! here's a quick quote: "A rose can only ensure its reappearance in the following spring if it lets itself go to seed and die. The seeds are ready only at the end of its life of blossoming, and only such seasoned seeds will be capable of sprouting in the future. The end is the necessary assurance for resurrection. We may have to die in many ways in order to live in new ways." I think this is a valuable thought to keep in mind as we try to sprout new M seeds. Gotta run!
Ballroom Dance Lesson 4. W came home in time to eat tonite (that's a first!) and off we went. No convo in the car but she didn't seem pissy at least. We had a nice lesson, although again, she seems to like to bring up my errors It would be kind of nice to hear "hey, you did pretty good that time" but that's not the headspace she's in these days. At least she wasn't mean. We had fun but I found myself getting a little frustrated with me! I think I'm beginning to think I should be better at this than I am, I mean we've had four lessons In the car I shared this with her, my frustration with myself and the need for patience. She responded nicely, "you really can't expect to do that much better in a class this size, the instructors don't have the time to really help people get it right" I talked about my aerobics class (which is really a combination of a dozen art and martial arts disciplines all tied in together) and how it took me almost a year to feel really comfortable with the routines and my own performance. We talked about class length and was 1. 5 hours better than 3 hours or vise versa. W takes ethnic dance and ballet, as well as BR dance with me! She would know. So we had a nice convo, she showed some empathy in dealing with my latent perfectionist tendency (which I tend to hide from people), so all is well in my neck of the woods. I just hope my feet don't hurt like last week!
Actually, we come straight home after class every Tuesday night to watch "Dancing With The Stars" with the kids! It's our "family" show. Thanks for checking in Ginger.
Here's tonite's goodie from my reading adventures: "the fact that "love is blind" gives us all a chance to be loved by somebody." It's like winning the lottery without even buying a ticket! OK, not quite Here's an interesting one, "When you find a partner's traits distressing, it is important not to attempt to change her or him but to work on how to handle what you find unappealing. It is harder to defang the bobcat than to learn to protect ourselves" What do you think, guys? It sounds kind of un-DB or is it?
No I do not really think it sounds like Un-DB. Because you know you can not change anyone but yourself. The traits that are unappealing are the things that the W/H need to change on their own. If not why worry about it, you just have to accept it if you love the person and move on. Everyone has traits that we do not really like but we look past them because there are so many more that we love. Just my 2 cents.
Ben 32 STBXW 29 3 kids (D1,S4,SD8) (1 dog 5months) Status: Fighting for the Kids.
"The only thing we know about future developments is that they will develope."
" To stay with ourself or our friend or partner in this way requires that we be free of the need to clear things up or assume control. One person simply accepts the other's truth no matter how unclear, broken, desperate, or fragmented it may be"