Originally Posted by Gerkaguards
I'm worried about calling and getting more, "Stop emailing me" "stop calling me" "you ruined any chance of us reconciling, leave me alone." That stuff is tough to respond to in real time.

Well if you plan on trying to reconcile with your WW you are going to have to eventually learn how to do it. I lived through several months of that at the same house. They key is not responding to it. Let her rant and vent, and all you say is, "I'm sorry you feel that way," until she calms down.

Remember Dr. Harley's three stages of a relationship: Intimacy, Conflict, and Withdrawal. She hasn't seen you in months and hasn't spoken to you in a month, so with just the emails, she's in withdrawal with a just a toe in the conflict stage. If you want to get from withdrawal to intimacy, you can't bypass conflict. Your goal now is to engage her more so that you can push her from withdrawal back to conflict. By her birthday, the worst of the withdrawal from OM and reaction to exposure should be over. Now, it will still be bad, but you are not in this to avoid conflict. This is how you need to get the relationship moving again.

Last edited by jmwc95; 05/11/10 07:54 AM.

Jim

BS - 32 (me)
FWW - 33
Married 8/31/03
No kids (but 3 cats)
D-Days - 8/25/06 (EA), 11/3/06 (PA)
NC agreed to - 11/8/06
NC broken - 11/28/06, 12/16/06, 1/18/07, 1/26/07, 1/27/07
Status - In Recovery
Jim's Story