You're not imposing, Sugar, and I will help as much as I, in my limited capacity, can. I think there are others that are the masters at speaking to this. Like I said, Was2 is one of them. MGoBlue has some awesome stuff on the MLC thread right now.
It's hard in some ways, because you have not posted much lately, and so it's hard to see where you are, what you have been doing, what has been going through your mind.
That's why your post came as such a shocker to me. I guess I assumed in your time away, you were detaching, you were reconciling these things, you were finding peace and clarity. Instead, I saw backsliding.
Now for your questions: MY concept of forgiveness and unconditional love? Gee, didn't know those two were open to subjective interpretation. I think the example is set out for us in the life and death of Christ. Of course, none of us can live up to that, but that's the goal. Paul wrote in Collossians 3:13: "Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you."
MY concept of detachment? Again, not original to me, but I took it from the MLC resources thread, early on, cut it out, tatooed it to my chest.
And no it is not giving up; it is letting go. Read it. Re-read it. Re-read it again.
And no, giving it over to God is not giving up. It is surrendering control. Leaning not on your own understanding but putting your trust and faith in the Lord. He is never going to let you down.
He may not always give you the answer you want. The answer may come not as a solution to your problems but the message that you will have all you need to get through them. Accepting that is part of having faith, accepting that you don't know what the outcome should be but that God will always take care of you.
WCW is saying that you are proclaiming your intent to "stand", and that I don't get that, and her implication is that I'm not a "stander". I don't know how she makes that judgment about me, but that's beside the point. Yes, I do get that you have renewed your committment to standing, but what fig and I read is that you believe that you either choose to stand or you choose to detach. Because, again, detaching in your mind, means giving up.
And that's not it at all.
You can do both. You have to. You have to accept that even if you stand, you can't control the outcome. And you can't control her. The only thing you can control is you.
And you can say you gave her those earrings with no expectations, but I call BS on that. Otherwise, you wouldn't have reacted the way you did. And, yes, she was trying to control you. She was pushing back against your control of her. Control that she is determined you are no longer going to have.
You don't stand by giving her gifts. You don't stand by trying to change her. You don't stand by arranging things. You don't stand by controlling the outcome.
You stand by keeping your heart open to the possibility that if this person ever decides to come back to you and your marriage that you will receive them back with love and forgiveness.
That's it. Beyond that, you go on. You start living life for you and your kids. You take one day at a time and enjoy it. You count your blessings. You see good in people. You find your purpose in life. You try new things and keep the good and discard the bad. You dream dreams. You buy shoes!
You pray alot. A whole lot.
I'll just say too, that you could learn alot over on the MLC thread. We're not just a bunch of partying fools as some people believe on this board. There are some incredibly insightful, compassionate, enlightened folks over there that have been on this journey a long time, and have taught me so much. I know I couldn't have made it without them.
I'll just leave you with this. I just read it yesterday, and I found it very comforting:
Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily hinders our progress. And let us run with endurance the race that God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, on whom our faith depends from start to finish. ~ Hebrews 12:1-2.
