ITA with Mel, as I have never seen her steer someone wrong.

As far as the question goes, Yes you do, or you wouldn't be here. Everything here had it been done to a tee, when my marrige first recovered would have avoided much pain for myself, my late wife, and my children.

Take full advantage of this place and DR H. You will never regret it.

He did, yes. Thanks for the kind words. Do you think I am being abused? If so, how? I am not seeing it. She hasn't ever told me that i needed to forgive her (though i believe I do). Maybe i am missing something.

CV

CP, that's partially right. I have never made excuses for her. What i was looking for were contributing factors. While I looked into it I *did* include her in it, we talked probably dozens of hours, read countless books... But you are right that I feel sometimes that I am trying to figure it out myself. How she helps me with them is a question for me. What does that practically look like? So I guess, the answer is yes and no?

Cv

Ok, so maybe what you need to do is get after yourself then? If she is doing everything possible, and is totally complient, then maybe you have to tell yourself that it is foolish to not get over it. Mel made that point earlier, and she sees more than I do.

I remember a time when I had to identify my fears, and put them behind for what I understood was my wives sake. Granted I had good reason to be afraid, and was not thourough in the recovery and restoration process, but if I was going to set my wife free from the past, it also had to be gone from my mind and thoughts. It was possible because I had seen some great improvements, and as you guys use the tools on this site, and time passes, you will also be able to push fear away. Wish I had this site a long time ago, and the support, but thats water under the bridge.

I accually used to get mad at myself and tell myself off when negativity and doubt creeped in, using what was right in front of me as evidence that it was all in my head. Thankfully you have this place and the MB concepts to be real solid tools. All I had was hope and no counsel except for myself and the large blanket of restoration promise from God.

It can be very confusing without precise and accurate counsel, and his Angels work through this place as you can see.

Time to set it back to zero, and enjoy learning about yourself and your needs, through this awesome place. I will be like living each day new, like it is supposed to be, once you identify your needs and stop wondering why you have them. I know that sounds spacey right now, but in a few months of exploring this stuff, it will make more sense than anything.

Happy Voyage

It will help if you do not use her as a case study, or talk with her like.."See when you did that.. and this happened.." Like Mel said, that will be a trigger and destructive for you both.

This where you must trust in her actions, and what you have both learned from the concepts, and really ask the questions that are bothering you, directly expecting an answer. If you think about it and decide it was trick of the mind, an old song or place that brought out old fears, you can take it to God and/or laugh it off. Being totally tranparent between each other and honest will help greatly in nipping it in the bud when worry starts to happen.

Example: "I don't want you to be alone with so-n-so,(member of the opposite sex)", and stop right there before you give reasons. You don't have to be "Big enough" or "secure enough" to allow that. A jealous mate is a good thing, it not an insult to your character, and it damn sure isn't the time to be controlling or bring up the past from any aspect. You should be jealous of the time each other spends with the opposite sex, or anytime that robs you of each other. Time spent away from each other separates the life you live together. Its you as a team that is the strongest right?

But being the passive agressive one and skirting around the issue would be. "Well remember how you get when you.." or maybe even, "Well you remember how when before?..". Just no and thats it will help you both learn how to to respect and trust each other. I remember just no when I used to use it and my W was much more secure with boundaries I would not waver from. If anytime I was her rock, it was then. Your wife can be yours too, buy being clear and setting her own boundaries and asking you to honor them. "My H does not work on such and such days, because that is our date night", and she protects your home and hearth by protecting what I hope you have agreed to with POJA and enthusiastic agreement. "Damn right" you say.

The first thing we try to do is anylyze "why" when we are floored by something we don't understand. Affairs, being the most painful, can bring in all sorts of intellectualizing. (Is that really a word?). Its because its such a gut punch, and so scary to us, that we are so afraid to admit we were not lovable at the moment, or that we let the others needs go so far unattended to, that we come up with all kinds of reasons why they were messed up and had no boundaries. Granted their needs might be weird and out of balance, but addressing them up front ussually takes the mystery out of them and brings them down to earth. That part takes time sometimes, when we make our needs so unable for anyone to meet.

Thats where God steps in, because we are only human, and he brings us out of the clouds. Funny isn't it? Hes up there but we belong down here and he puts us back here when we step over our boundaries with him too.

Yeah, I have seen that I've "case-studied" her. We have been taking different approaches to our conversations. Much more productive. Today was good. We had a good 6 hours in the car and were able to communicate about a lot of things that traditionally triggered me.


I don't have many "trigger places" anymore. We have worked hard on this from probably the first few weeks after DDay. Songs still bug me sometimes. I am going to try your suggestions on responding and see how it helps.


I like the idea of taking the mystery out... Ok, a lot to think about. Thank you! I think this can be accomplished easily, and what i need to do is make her feel secure with boundaries and maybe even feel like she belongs here.

CV

For those of you reading both my thread and my W. I am hoping she will be able to post tonight, she had a lot of eye tests done yesterday, and her eyes are really bad today from the tests. Just an FYI for those reading and posting on her thread.

For those that pray... Her eye surgery is July 20th. Corneal transplant...

CV

OK, this is funny and not at the same time... My wife just finished SAA... This is the book she purchased for us almost 3 years ago after DDAy. Apparently we read the book it ticked me off and I trashed it. Ah well... nearly three years later, we have survived and implemented most of what it said by instinct and the hard way... Now we are using the book to refine....

If I was a tight wad I would have kept it and saved myself some money... ugh

CV

Based on the impression FWW and I got from SAA, which we read together after using the articles here and the forums, you may have gotten a BS to blame sense out of it.

Strange enough, that ticked off FWW more than I.

Alas, I gave our copy away fruitlessly hoping to pay it forward.

Yeah. I think part of it is my reading style preference. I prefer books that are more "do this" that "let me use this story as an example". I have had to adjust to taste preferences in reading.

smallT/J
Just wondering HHH, Based on the "BS to blame" aspect you had gotten from SAA, do you feel that your W was beating herself up when she got mad about it? I mean in that protective of her H sort of way, a little overeaction, like a little shockwave that woke her up.

That is an awesome thing to see in your W, a little bit assuming I guess in that they try to mother you, but a completly understandable place they come from emotionally. My reaction was to smile and hug her, and leave the door open to discuss anything, and comfort if I could. I didn't want her to bear all the burden, maybe she had some strange ideas based on some misunderstood emotions and needs that were not fufilled. But it was time to move forward and understand them and I was there to help.

I wish we had made the time to do more when we had a chance, or maybe had different resources that worked better in UA time.

Just what you said reminded me of being loved and having someone covering my back. end T/J

By the time we started reading SAA? Yes. I think part of it was becoming protective, I think part of it was owning up for herself. She was the one who brought it up first, actually. Struck me as funny.

CV... I uh... forgot what I had to say...

lol... S'ok...

I had a question...Was curious what everyone thought. Should i request to have this thread moved to recovery?

CV,

I don't know. Your W is still posting here. It seems most are accustomed to finding your posts here. I guess I would not move it just yet. Your call though.

God Bless,

JL

I just wanted to give an update on my thread since I've been posting all over the place... We aren't MB vets, but I (think) that I am able to assimilate information at a fairly fast pace. Probably from being in school for so darned long.

We are doing very well in our recovery... In fact, Grace asked me the other day: "Are we really doing this well?"

Well, yes we are. We are johnny-come-lately's to MB, but we are applying the principles (much of then we learned the hard way)and we are thriving. Still get down sometimes, but I am able to anticipate and tell her. It helps us deal with it together.

On a funnier note, we have three teenagers... Well, one 20 year old and two teenagers.. we made all three of them take the ENQ's with their BF or GFs. WOW... What a conversation starter those were. Well, youngest just had a nasty breakup, but he did his anyway.

Our middle child graduated on friday... We are happy as punch. She begins school in the fall.

If anyone thinks of it, pray for me. My paid ministry contract ended. Same amount of work, no money. So i am job hunting, but we aren't worried. We are going to hang out here on SAA for a while. We are well into recovery I think, but we consider ourselves survivors and we like being here on this forum.

Hope no one minds.


CV

I am proud to know you are here, and I hope you come here often. Sounds like a real success story and I love the part about the ENGs with the young ones. What a awesome investment.

God Bless you guys

our kids are our greatest achievement. It was always a joint venture between us, no matter how bad things got. They may hate us after we make them do the LB questionnaire though!

Congrats CV,

On the children and the marriage getting better. Now you just have to find a job, right? I am thinking you will do that as well.


God Bless,

JL

CV, it's a pleasure to hang with you and the missus! I think you're both a great addition to the group! Prayers going up on the job! (Even though you know that God's got that all figured out already )

cv and grace,

It's been fun reading your posts and progress.

My two DD's (34 and 27) have been "schooled" in MB concepts. Both are in great relationships, and although neither of them realize that they use the MB concepts, they both use the ideas all the time in their marriages! They talk all the time of emotional needs, openness and honesty, joint agreement, etc. They have great relationships, and work at the emotional needs aspects. They even have "invented" a few ENs of their own:

scholastic support (one is working on a Ph.D.)
artistic endeavors support (one is an artist and musician, and actually the Ph.D. student is married to an artist!)

They are funny, but they work for their relationships. DD27 told me recently that the best thing I ever taught her was the idea that when things were not going well in a relationship, you had to focus on that thing, and TALK about it instead of getting mad and yelling about it.

She was really cute telling us about how her previous relationship was, and this marriage is. She said that the old boyfriend refused to use the ideas, and that relationship just never would gel. She said that she wanted to talk about a problem that they were having, and he said, "Oh, so you want to fight?" and she said, "No, it would be very good if we could just talk and explore what the issues were, so we could make good decisions about how to meet each other's needs and improve the relationship." He said to her, "So that means you want to fight, so let's fight!"

She said she told him, "Okay, I suppose we could stay up all night, you could yell and I could cry, but in reality, wouldn't it be better if we just each said what we thought might work better, and then use the good ideas and fix the problem?"

She said he chose to yell instead. She left him.


In the new marriage, she gave a really good example of talking out an issue using MB concepts and her H's emotional needs regarding domestic support and family time during cooking of meals. They worked out a plan as to how they will fix meals together, and now have a terrific time together, increasing their UA time.......

She said she knew this man was a keeper!


It pays to talk about how to do the right things in relationships, so your kids understand what you are doing and why you are doing things. Whether you believe it or not, they are watching every single thing you do, and learning from it. They swear they won't grow up to be like us,

but they do. And they do it better, if we teach them better!




BTW, about your job, God will open the door when He is ready. But you knew that.


SB