I posted on piecing for a while, as H had come home after being with OW more or less every night for almost 3 months. He was only home for a little over 2 weeks (9 days of which we were out of town together on a business/part pleasure trip, so he didn't have a choice to leave). He left again a few nights ago.
Long story very short: Been married a 9.5 years. Have had a paltry sex life for a lot of it, but getting worse over the last few years probably. I had a low sex drive. He seemed to be bringing it up less and less the past few years, so I thought maybe it wasn't bothering him as much. On the contrary, it was pushing him out of wanting to be with me anymore, which I honestly had not idea it was getting that bad. I would never have let him be so miserable had I just understood...
Anyway, I found out mid November that he was having an A with OW. A few weeks or so later, he told me that he had decided to give our M another chance but that he just didn't know when or how. So, I waited... We already had the trip I mentioned above planned at that time, and he kept telling me that we were going to go together as a "couple" and to keep the plans in place, so I did.
Well, he did finally come home, but it was almost 3 months after he left and just a week or so before our trip. I had been doing a decent (though not perfect) job of DB'ing starting mid January or so. And I guess I thought that when he finally did come home we were going to start piecing, but that didn't happen. He didn't want to talk about the R at all or the OW, so I had no idea what he had told her before he came home, what our plans were as far as working on our M, etc. It was gut-wrenching. He said he just wanted to for now pretend like this hadn't happened. He also told me that he wanted me to want him more. So I made every effort to ML to him as much as I could and to work on my sex drive. I tried to be supporting, loving, caring, give him his space the best I could, etc. But you could cut the tension in the air with a knife. I think I felt worse when he came home than right before he came home. I guess I was getting used to him not being home and was getting into my routine and was just waiting for him to come home as he promised, so I at least had that to hold on to and keep me going.
The problem was, I was ready to dive in and figure this thing out. He physically came home, but emotionally he was just not here. Although we did ML several times, both before we left and during the trip, he also turned me down a few times(never heard of before this), and he was just noticeably distant and seemed so incredibly unhappy. He was short with me a lot, and I felt like I was constantly walking on eggshells around him.
This state of emotional dishevel for me unfortunately sent me back into some bad ways of pushing him to talk to me, probably being too needy, etc. He never once asked me what I needed from him to work on this, and I asked him several times what I should do to support him. I finally told him a couple of things that he could do to help me (like holding my hand while we were out), and he did do that consistently, which was nice. But he still just was not "there."
We did have a nice trip away, but it was strained. I know that was to be expected. And, looking back, I don't think it was wise for him to just come home a week or so before we left and then spend that much time together like that. It was probably too much, too soon.
The night before we came home from our trip, all hell broke loose. He was talking to someone on my cell phone, and his cell phone rang. I picked it up to get it for him and just missed the call. So I (innocently, I promise) opened up his phone to check the missed call so that I could tell him who had called. Well, I saw on that missed call list that the OW had sent him two missed text messages that day. I did not scroll to them to see what they said - just merely got sick to my stomach immediately, started shaking, and wanted to throw up.
When he got off of my phone, I asked him about it and asked him if we could talk. He asked what I wanted to talk about! At any rate, I don't want this post to get too long and drawn out, but basically we ended up talking for probably 6 hours altogether throughout the night and got hardly any sleep. It was heart-wrenching.
He told me that he had not fully ended it with her yet, that he had told her that he was going to take some time to sort through some things and that he was going on this trip, etc. I didn't ask him if he even told her that he was going on the trip with me, so I don't know if she even knew that. He told me for probably 2 1/2 months consistently (without wavering) that he had decided to give us another chance. I asked him why he hadn't told her that, and he said he just didn't want to hurt anyone. I asked him if it was because he didn't know for sure if he was going to give us another chance, and he said he didn't know...
So we hashed through a lot of things but didn't really come to any resolution. In the morning, I was so distraught and just wanted to find some sort of common ground to go forward on. So I asked him if we could just go on on the premise that we would not make any rash decisions and would work on our M slowly and that I would work on backing off of him and that he would work on us when he was ready. He agreed.
We had a nice but strained last day there, and my stomach was in knots all day. He still held my hand when we were out. I asked him a few follow-up questions from our conversation the night before (I know I should have just let it go, but I was in such a bad place and still needed closure). He wasn't defensive and answered my questions, and I tried to just ask a question or two and then just let it go for the time being.
We took an evening flight home that night and got home early in the morning last weekend. We drove home, and he immediately got ready and went to an appointment and then to visit the contractor who does work for us in our business. He told me early evening that he was on his way home to get some rest, as we were both so tired from the last few days. When I got home, he was asleep on the couch. I tried to wake him to get him to go to bed, but he wouldn't budge. So I just let him sleep there, and I went to sleep in the guest bedroom so that if he did come to bed he wouldn't have to sleep with me. I wasn't sure if he had intentionally fallen asleep on the couch. He did come to bed later that night.
The next day (Monday) we both worked all day. We have a very successful business together, and we are the only ones in the business. Later that night, he said he was going to work really late at our job site. I went over there around 9pm to go over some work items with him, and before I left I told him I needed to ask him a few things. I know, I shouldn't have. I just felt so dang unsettled inside and had been sick to my stomach all day. I just wanted to somehow feel better and be able to focus again.
When we had our long talk on our trip, one of the things he asked me about is how I felt if we didn't stay together as a couple but stayed together as business partners. I had responded that I didn't know if I could contribute everything I do to our business only to have him share that with someone else.
Well, I asked him on Monday night if that was what he wanted, to not being together romantically but to be in business together. He said that that was obviously something he was thinking about and sorting through. In the end, he agreed to keep working on us to see how it would go. He said he probably wasn't going to come home that night, that he was going to work all night at the job site (uh-oh - red flag). So I left really upset and tried to call him when I was almost home - he didn't answer. So I drove back up to the job site and just told him that I hoped he would put himself in my position and consider how hard it would be on me for him not to come home at all. He got really upset at me - huge backfire. I had asked him earlier if he was going to stay with the OW, and he said no. But I just wanted him to somehow open his eyes and consider my feelings, that for him to just stay out all night, even if he was working, would just tear me apart. But my merely trying to point that out to him did not go over so well...
At any rate, he didn't come home that night, but he did sleep at our office (I snooped...).
The next day, I gave him his space and did not have any contact with him until around 4pm, when I called him for some business stuff. He was kind of short with me (nothing really new). I asked him if we were "okay," and he said yes. He told me he had a meeting at 530pm, and he agreed to call me when he was done. I also had a meeting that night, and I got done at around 7pm. I called him to let him know I was done with my meeting. I got his voicemail and just left a message. He never called me back that night.
When I got home that night (Tuesday), I came home to find that he had packed a bag again of clothes and toiletries for himself... I was absolutely devastated. How could he do that to me again after only a few weeks of being home? And how could he do that having told me that we were okay just hours earlier (I know he had already been home and packed his bag by then). Why couldn't he have told me in person or even left a note? It was horrible, and I just cried and cried.
Wednesday, he fell off the face of the planet. He didn't show up at the job site all day, the guys at the job site couldn't reach him, etc. I did not call him at all or see him either. I snooped to see if his car was at OW's house but never found it (doesn't mean I just didn't see it). He didn't come home that night either.
Thursday morning I ran into him at the job site. I asked if he was okay and he said yes. I asked if he felt like talking that day, and he said maybe we could grab lunch. I asked him if we were okay, and he laughed. I asked him why he was laughing, and he said that that was all he could do at this point. But he did say that we were okay.
Things got hectic and we didn't end up having a talk at lunch, but we did talk for a little while over the phone in the afternoon. I told him my thoughts about us taking things too fast and that I wondered if he would be open to us slowing things down and just working on being friends for now and working on the R once some healing had taken place. He said that might be better than what we did. He said he was just sorting through his feelings and thinking about the last couple of weeks and few months and few years. We left the conversation at that. I asked him if he was coming home that night (Thursday), and he said he didn't know (when I knew meant no). And he didn't. I snooped again and didn't see his car at her house. Yesterday when I went to our office it looked as if he had slept there, but I had gone to the office at about 1:30 in the morning (snooping), and he wasn't there then.
Before I finish the story, I DO know that snooping is very bad for me to be doing. I had stopped doing that a few weeks into January before, and I felt so much better. But I guess it was easier back then because I knew he was staying with her the majority of the time, so there was no mystery in it. And it just hurt to have any sort of visual verification of that, so I gave it up and felt a lot better.
But now, I DIDN'T know what he was up to for sure, so I felt the need to snoop again. I just wanted to know for sure what I was up against.
On Thursday night, I got hardly no sleep, and a strange strength came over me at some point that I fed off of most of the night. I decided I wanted to just ask him if he was with her again so that I could make some decisions of my own. Then I started to go down the path of what I wanted to do about the business if we weren't together. I found a quiet strength and felt at peace, but I was probably just delirious.
At any rate, I sat down with him yesterday (Friday) and told him that I was working on making some decisions and needed to ask him a few questions. He said okay. I told him that I needed him to be honest with me, even if it hurt me. He agreed. I asked him if he had been staying with her, and he said no. I asked him if he had seen her, and he said yes. I asked him if that meant that he had made his decision then, that he was going to be with her and not me, or if he was still sorting through things.
In the end, he said that he didn't want to be married to me anymore and that he didn't know what to do about the business, etc. He said he was emotionally just done with us and that he wanted to be with her. I asked him if he was just saying that because he was upset (he told me at the beginning of our conversation tht he was tired of having these conversations). He said no, that it was harder for him to say he was done, that the easier thing to say would be that he would be willing to work on us.
Anyway, we talked for a while longer, and ultimately he agreed (at least for now) that we could stay married and work on being friends and work on the business together and see if anything sparked in the future that we could build on. He also said he was going to continue his R with the OW in the meantime and that he wasn't going to tell me what he was doing and when, etc.
Wow - talk about a sucker punch. I was absolutely devasted.
What do I do now? I know I need desperately do go back to hard core LRT and DB'ing. I do know that. I know I need to GAL again. I honestly feel like that if somehow that R can die its own death that we can work through this. But how in the world do I hold on in the meantime? I know I need to do things to be more attractive to him than her, especially not pressuring him anymore and having conversations like these that make him hurt and angry.
I just feel so lost inside. Am I wrong to still have hope? I feel crazy to even think about agreeing to let him sleep with OW and stay "friends" with him and work with him everyday, but isn't that a small price to pay if our M can somehow work out in the end?
I didn't sleep much again last night and feel horrible again today. I'm desperate to somehow find a way to feel better. My work is suffering big time - I just can't concentrate. It's been like that since November when I found out about all of this. I keep doing the minimal amount just to get things done, and things are starting to fall through the cracks. I was hoping once we went on our trip and he came home that I could finally settle my insides and get back into gear, but now we just backslid so far....
Enough of a saga for now... I'm sure there are details that I may need to fill you in on later. (For instance, when I started DB'ing fairly well in January, he DID come home two separate nights and stayed the night and ML to me - baby steps?) I think he still cares but cares more about her right now and is cutting me off because it's easier.
PLEASE HELP ME! I know what you're going to say as far as needing to DB and LRT and keep my distance and GAL. I know all of those things, and I will work towards that. I'm just in the early stages of this horrible conversation yesterday, as he's never told me that he had decided that he was just done and didn't want to be married to me anymore. Was he just lashing out? I don't know. Please help me get through this initial pain. I hurt so much...
I tried to wake him to get him to go to bed, but he wouldn't budge. So I just let him sleep there, and I went to sleep in the guest bedroom so that if he did come to bed he wouldn't have to sleep with me. I wasn't sure if he had intentionally fallen asleep on the couch. He did come to bed later that night.
