I am working on it! Thank you, Mrs. Vanilla for all your posts and advice.

GM,

I just want to say a little bit about the dilemma you have over not feeling in love with DWG, in the same way you felt towards OW.

You need to stop indulging the fantasy. That's all it is. The relationship with OW was nothing but lies and vapors, smoke and mirrors. You were not in love with her. You were in love with your own perfect reflection in the magic mirror she was holding for you.

When you find yourself thinking fondly in any way about OW or your feelings during the A, demand better of yourself. Stop those thoughts dead in their tracks by confronting them for the lies they are.

"Stop! That's a lie! That relationship was built on evil and deception! No more! I choose real life with the real woman who loves me!"

Don't give the fond thoughts any quarter. They are lies. Embrace the truth.

My condolences on the loss of your retriever. I am glad to hear that things are a bit better for the 2 of you the last 24 hours.

Believe me, I know that very well. I think you are a bit confused about what I have been writing. I never think of OW. That relationship was fake and nasty to boot. I have no thoughts of her. It seems a century ago. Also, like some others who posted responses, you are concluding that those comparisons are happening in my own thoughts and are bothering me. If you re-read the last bunch of pages, it is DWG who has been bothered by this comparison, enough to occupy her thoughts constantly, and her dreams as well. I have been struggling with how to help her with that. I think we have had a breakthrough with that in the last day, so I am very grateful for all the help and insights here. I do appreciate your concern, Chrysalis. And thank you, also, for the condolences. It is interesting about beloved pets. It seems to affect us often more than the loss of a sibling or parent, because we basically inherited the former, but we choose our pets and put ourselves into them. So losing them is actually losing major parts of ourselves. At least it seems like that to me.

GM,

Fair enough, the topic of "in love with OW" is one that pushes my buttons because of my own history. I apologize if I was unfair to you. And I appreciate the effort you are putting into helping DWG.

Pets.....my kids are all very in tune to the family pets. It makes for great grief, sometimes, but that is a price worth paying for the love they give.

No problem. It was hard to tell from my description of what the problem was.

Yep, having those critters is worth the grief that is eventually gonna happen.

Has it ever occurred to you, that DWG has NEVER experienced romantic love the entire duration of your M? While you have .... just not with DWG, your wife.

She doubts that it is possible.
With good reason.

Well, it does occur to me in a big way now, and this thought has been devastating to her. But what focusing on this has done is make me get past the acute problem and really examine my feelings about DWG, and there is nothing lacking there. In fact, it is overwhelming. I have been suppressing it, which is a longstanding problem for me, which became a habit. I am learning to recognize and acknowledge my feelings and communicate it to her better. I really do think we have been making some sort of breakthrough on this, Pepperband. I know that you care for her a great deal, and I am grateful for your friendship to her and your help to me as well. Things are looking up.

"I adore you" is not a silly thing to say to your wife.
"You are precious to me" is not stupid.

My husband of 29 years emails me love songs.
He made a decision to court me on a daily basis, a long time ago ...

As H likes to say
"Happy wife, happy life".

I really don't give a chit if it feels weird, or makes you uncomfortable to be over-the-top expressive towards my friend, your wife. I don't really care if you don't feel ready, or sincere.

Do it.
Every day.

Of course. Every WS has to suppress any positive feelings they have for their BS, or else they wouldn't have all that time and energy to pour into somebody else.

You are so right when you say it becomes a habit - and then it becomes an entitlement - and then it's just normal life, the way it's supposed to be. And anybody who thinks otherwise is just dead wrong and becomes an enemy.

I feel so stupid and incompetent for never learning this. And I am, actually, in these kinds of things. But it's changing. I know you are dead on right, Pepperband. This is new territory for me, oddly enough. Pretty sad, isn't it? But I'm starting it. And it feels good.

Yep. That was my mentality for years. Its appalling, looking back. I was the cause of all of my unhappiness and all of DWG's pain, and now she has to somehow live with that pain. All I can do is not be that any longer and be the source of her happiness. If I do that long enough, well...maybe the pain will become bearable. There is only one viable path ahead. All the others lead deeper into darkness.

New territory is good.
Don'cha know.

Yep

GM,

Are you going silent again? Will you discuss why you want to befriend a woman on facebook? Do you think you are protecting your BWs feelings with your internet conversations with this woman?

AM

Dear armymama. I have not been on that thread, so it is not on my list of watched topics. Unless DWG posted some misinformation, then you have mis-read her. This all started because I REFUSED a facebook request from her and told DWG about it. Because she is the widow of a famous musician, and because she has met me and talked to me at some music events, I felt compelled to click the "message button" on the ignore friend area and told her why I was NOT friending her. She messaged back some paragraph about how she was just routinely friending after a suggested friend message based on mutual acquaintances, and said that she was offended and hurt by my comment. So, foolishly I messaged back, mentioning how it is not appropriate for me to be friending unmarried women on Facebook and not to be offended, because "I like you very much". That was the big mistake and issue with DWG. For me, it was something i was saying insincerely to be polite and let her know strongly that I did not mean to offend her. So, she came back with more garbage about how she was just a poor, widowed woman with few friends and was only offering help with a couple of music organizations that I am part of.

DWG was furious and hurt that I would write "I like you very much", and I see her point. To make it even more stupid, I had been warned by a board member of one of my music organizations, where I sit on the board, to watch out for this woman, because she is after men constantly. So, I should have just ignored her request and not sent the original message. This woman was playing me, and the "offended" bit was just a huge manipulation.

I have always, all my adult life, been a sucker for these kinds of manipulations, so DWG was rightly very concerned, hurt, and frightened by my "I like you very much, but" response to her. DWG and I had a long discussion about how women manipulate men, the methods they use to do this, and what I should have been reading between the lines of her "hurt" response. She explained to me that this was the classic "damsel in distress" ploy, which I am patterned to fall for for two reasons. 1) I am a man, so I am born susceptible to this and 2) I am a retired physician, and I spent a career trying to jump in and save this person or that person's problem.

But for me and for both of those reasons, as well as my history, it is extremely dangerous for me to fall for this kind of thing. So, I learned a lot about women and how they manipulate men that I never really learned understood before, and DWG helped me do that. I have eBlaster on my computer, so everything I do and post is quite visible to DWG, and I discussed this episode immediately with DWG while it was occurring, though DWG did not know about the "I like you very much, but" comment until she read it on my keylogger report. That is what raised a huge flag for her and led to her strong reaction and posts on this forum in another thread.

I hope that explains it sufficiently. I did not friend nor try to friend that woman, and I was open and honest with DWG about it from the get go. But my falling for her "hurt and offended" ploy was a red flag, and I realize that it was incredibly stupid and violated my plan to protect my emotional weaknesses" and that it was unbelievably stupid to say "I like you very much, but....etc." I realize that now, have learned from it, have updated my plan, and that is really the end of the matter for both DWG and myself.

If you are aware that you are a sucker for manipulation, why do you have a facebook page? Is it something that is necessary?

AM

At this point, it is kind of necessary, because both of our sons communicate almost exclusively by Facebook, and we can keep up with their lives, as they have moved away but are very active in music in two different cities, including NYC. One of them is a poor communicator, so we can keep up with his life through Facebook. Though sharing a single account would accomplish that, we have been involved in some organizations that lead us to have separate circles of "friends" that communicate things, and neither of us wants to have many messages per day coming into our smartphones that have nothing to do with us. The notifications, alone, are disruptive.

There might be some better way, but as long as I have eBlaster installed, there is no chance that I could be pulled off into some bad direction that would threaten our recovery and marriage.

The fact is, you DO NOT "like" her at all.
Let alone, "very much".

You were being dishonest. Again.

Even a casual observer recognizes that you are still comfortable with dishonesty.

Honesty is not one honest act.
Honesty is also a quality as well as a personal value.

Dishonesty is not one dishonest act.
Dishonesty is also a quality as well as a personal value.

You STILL value dishonesty when you want to avoid something that is tough for you to do.

A person with the quality of, and who values honesty, will not (so effortlessly) lie to anyone.

You seem to focus on each misstep you make as if they were isolated events.
They are not.

You "get it" that this upset your wife.
What you fail to fully comprehend is that even small lies TO OTHER PEOPLE puts your character flaws in a bright spot light.

Let me ask you a question.
Were you ever dishonest making your medical reports?
Why or why not?

Let's pretend you did lie professionally.

Let's say you lied on a coroner report (not just an error) and got found out.
What do you think would have happened to your professional reputation?
Would you explain that you were just trying to spare someone's feelings by the lie?
Would you claim to have been "suckered" or "manipulated" by an outside influence to make a dishonest report?



You did not "fall".
You were dishonest, because that is what you do.



You were not "manipulated".
You lied.

I STRONGLY urge you to re-think these comments you made.
Can you see the ultimate purpose of your comments?

Both quoted comments were you excusing yourself for being dishonest.

Think about this.

If I see or hear my CURRENT husband (after 14.5 years of M recovery) being dishonest to ANYONE .... it is a

I do not want a dishonest spouse.
I do not want a scapegoating spouse.
Neither does your wife.

In that case, you only need 2 "friends" on FB.
Your sons.
You "ignore" other requests.

*LINK* to "The painful truth"

People of the Lie

Have you read this book, by M. Scott Peck MD?

You can avoid a lot of future pain for DWG if you accept the pain/discomfort of honest self examination and, ultimately, accept that truth is less worrisome than lies.

Little lies are dangerous too.

Especially for someone such as yourself.



Take care.