Mrs. Dreamland,<p>I hope you surf this site today. I had a great weekend with you and a great father's day. I hope you liked your Birthday.<p>I have been doing some real soul searching about what your EN's are. With a little more information you gave me on Friday night, I can give you my guess on the order of these. Here is my first stab at this:<p>1. Conversation
2. Affection
3. Admiration
4. Financial Support
5. Family Commitment
6. Sexual Fulfillment
7. Domestic Support
8. Honesty and Openness
9. Physical Attractiveness
10.Recreational Companionship<p>I will make this easy for you. All you have to do is say Hot or Cold, but some hints would be nice. See below link for explanation of needs:<p>Emotional Needs<p>
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To all BS's,<p>Post your WS's top five EN's. I am interested in seeing if you guessed these or if you were told. If you guessed, how did you come up with the order? Any insight would be appreciated. Thanks for your help.

Dreamland -<p>My H filled out the EN form and his top 5 were as follows:<p>1) Honesty
2) SF
3) Attractive Spouse
4) Recreational Companionship
5) Domestic Support<p>Personally I think Admiration is #1 so I work on that too. Luckily we have 3 of the same needs so while I work at meeting recreational companionship (for instance) my need is met as well.<p>Keep up the good work...I'm sure more information will be coming you way.

OK here is a try. My WW filled out an EN questionaire when all hell broke loose and refused to put them in order. As I look back at it it seems it was just a good mechanism for her to bash me and justify where she was coming from. Don't get me wrong, I deserved a lot of the poor scores she gave me but I don't think the effort realy was there.<p>With this in mind I will give my opinion as to her top ENs.<p>1. Affection
2. Financial Support
3. Sexual Fulfillment
4. - 7. Conversation, Family Commitment, Admiration, Recreational Companionship (what order???)<p>Now that I think about it I'm still confused as to what her needs are. I have gotten some positive results during Plan A from all of them. I hope I get the chance have a conversation about her needs in the future.

Dreamland:<p>You have asked me to list my ENs for you in the past and I have tried to come up with a ranked list for you. But, until now, I have been unsuccessful. I am still not sure if the following list is completely accurate, but here it is:<p>1. Conversation - I have always asked you to call me during the day. I love people and conversing. This is a big reason why being at home with little ones is so difficult.
2. Financial Support - Love to work when I know I don't HAVE to.
3. Attractiveness of Spouce - like for you to look and smell good (which you do)
4. Affection - shows thoughtfulness
5. Family Commitment - your great with your boys and family is a number 1 priority for you
6. Sexual Fulfillment - how do I comment?!?!
7. Domestic Support - I appreciate your help around the house.
8. Admiration - You do a great job complimenting me and what I do. Thank You
9. Honesty and Openness - we do a pretty good job now of talking about our feelings and opening up to each other - this is somewhat difficult for me though given the current situation
10. Recreationsal Companionship - we share a lot in common and both are pretty athletic and like to play<p>luv - wafer

Mrs. Dreamland - <p>I wanted to write a quick welcome for you to our little forum. I know your husband appreciates your comments and thoughts on your ENs.<p>Ont thing that struck me was your signature line, You called Dreamland "underserving H". I have learned from the MB concepts is that nobody deserves the good or bad things that happen in a marriage. A relationship is about hard work and when that work is not done and emotional needs are not met a relationship sours. <p>Both you and your husband deserve to be in a good relationship where there is love and your needs are met. I realize this may be difficult to imagine given everything that has and is going on in your lives. No matter what course you choose the road will be difficult but life is never easy. From reading Dreamland's posts I have found him to be caring and commited to working on a relationship with you. I believe this indicates the strong love he has for you.<p>I wish the day will come when my WW will share her ENs with me in a constructive manner. When the lines of communication are open and and honest effort is made anything is possible. <p>Have to go, I can only allow my daughter so much time to destroy my office while I post. [img]images/icons/grin.gif" border="0[/img]<p>[ June 17, 2002: Message edited by: onwardandup ]</p>

Mrs. Dreamland (my wonderful wife):<p>
Welcome to Marriage Builders. I am so happy to see you post here. The people at this site are going through many of the same things we are, and there are plenty of success stories. They are very supportive and knowledgeable about relationships and I have learned a great deal about sharing my feelings, meeting your wife’s needs, working on improving myself, etc. <p>Thank you for getting up early with me this morning and making me breakfast that was very nice. Since you are not a morning person, I know this was tough for you, and it meant the world to me. It made me feel real good. Gave me some foward momentum for the day. <p>I might have been pushy in the past for you to fill the EN list out and for that I am sorry. This list was very hard for me to fill out too (see our "Surviving an Affair" book for my EN list). I am sure if I looked at it again, some of the EN's would move around a bit. However, it does give us an ability to weigh some of the EN's with each other and provokes organized and thoughtful conversation. Additionally, it helps me to improve upon the way I love you and what is most important to you. I believe this is a learned behavior in a relationship all dependent upon good conversation. <p>In the past I have not been very receptive in your needs for communication. I remember you asking me to call you and telling me that you were lonely at work. How I wronged you by not calling and giving you the attention that you deserve. I am sorry. Please understand, I was not intentially trying to hurt you. I just did not understand your needs and how important it was for me to meet them. I would get so wrapped up with work that I would not take time out of my day for you (but that is no excuse). That was a big mistake on my part. I have made many mistakes these last couple of years and caused you so much pain. If only I had listened to you carefully because you were telling me what your needs were.<p>It looks like I got some of the order correct in your needs. I would like to talk to you in more detail later on how I can better meet some of your most important emotional needs, but from listening to you and watching you these last few months, you have already answered a good portion of my questions on how to fill your needs. You do deserve so much more than what I gave you prior to D-day. I am ashamed that I had to be shocked so hard in order to come to this realization. If I had only listened to you.<p>I would like to touch on some of your needs here for you to think about ways of allowing me to meet more of your needs. Please do not feel like I am pushing you here. There is no pressure for you to help in any of these matters:<p>1. Conversation: With everything going on, occassionally it seems like both of us just do not know what to say. From reading here, this is completely natural. When we both begin to feel less stressed and anxious about what is going on, the words will come back and these uncomfortable pauses will eventually disappear. When we get to these points, we should just not try and maybe watch a movie or if we are on the phone we can just say by.<p>I am exited about how much more we are talking. Conversation is (I think) #3 on my EN list. I feel so good when we talk. I feel very comfortable telling you about anything, and I get the feeling that you feel the same way. Unfortunately, we both get wrapped up in the busyness of life and kids and do not make enough time for each other to sit and talk. I am just as much (if not more) of an offender than you. One idea to help out with this is to instead of watching a little bit of TV a night (for everyone else we watch only 30 min to 45 min max), lets just talk. This does not have to be every night. We could try this every other night at first.<p>I have been calling you quite a bit during the day now. Is this sufficient or too much? I am scared about calling you too much. I do not want to smother you. Do not worry about you calling me, I love this. It makes me feel needed. I will let you know if it gets in the way of work. So far, it has never got in the way of work. <p>2. Financial support: [img]images/icons/shocked.gif" border="0[/img] I did not realize this was so important to you. Just goes to show you how I can misinterpret your needs. Fortunately, I think you are in a great position. You do not have to work for us to make ends meet. I know you would like more than just that. Is what I make now enough? I am always working hard to improve myself at work, and I am certain my salary will continue getting larger and larger every year. The bosses around the office are especially taking notice of my current efforts and I am sure will make my efforts worth while. If necessary I can easily give myself a 10% raise. All I would have to do is work one extra hour a day. I could leave at around 6:00 and quit work at around 5:30. This would give me 11 hour day and a 10% pay increase. I would only be home an average of 30 minutes later each day. It is not too much trouble for me and well worth it for you to feel like you can quit work at any time.<p>3. Attractiveness of Spouse: Another wow. Missed this one too. I have not done so good in this category in the past. For a while there I was not taking care of myself. I think I am doing a little better now. I have lost quite a bit of weight. I have been using my activities with the boys to excersice, and I have been getting my haircut regularly (Thursday this week at 12:30). I have been getting a little tan, and I have been drycleaning my own clothes as well as buying clothes when I need them. These changes all had to do with my Plan A. I have been working on myself and learning that I need to take care of myself. I feel good about the way I look now and I feel attractive. I hope that I am now. Any ideas on how I can better myself here?<p>4. Affection: I would love to be given the opportunity to fullfill this need for you. I know that this one is tough for you now. So, I have been keeping a little distance, but still trying to kiss and love on you anytime you will let me. How am I doing at this one now? Any suggestions? Would you like me to back off or add more affection?<p>5. Family Commitment: It looks like some of the things I am best at are further down in your list. I realized this. Unfortunately, these items far down on the list take up the majority of my time. I love being home to spend time with you and the boys. My slogan has always been (and I tell the people that work for me)"You work to live NOT live to work." <p>6. Sexual Fulfillment: I guess the jury is still out on this one. Not much I want to say for all ears.<p>7. Domestic Support: I think I am prety good at this one, but it is way down on your list. Unfortunately, this one takes the most time, and it appears like it has the least impact. If I am doing too much, let me know. I can spend more time on some the other more important needs. If I am doing too little or you would like for me to focus on specific items other than the ones I do let me know.<p>8. Admiration: Thank you for the compliment also. You too make me feel good here. I think that you are a very attractive intelligent woman, and I am delighted that you are my wife regardless of whatever has happened in the past. I am so lucky to have you and I am hopefull and confident that we will pull through this and have the perfect relationship with the knowledge we take from this.<p>9. Honesty and Openness: I too think we are very good at this. Because of your honesty and openess, I have been able to survive all of this. Things would be so much worse for me if you were not honest. In my opinion, you are the most honest and open WS I have heard about in this entire forum. Many of the BS's out there are very jeleous.<p>I realize this is very tough for you to tell me everything going on, but it will make all of the difference in us being able to rebuild our lifes together.<p>10. Recreationsal Companionship: dito.<p>I love you so very much. I hope you are having a great day.

Onwardandup,<p>Thanks for pointing out her signature line. You are absolutely right. We all make mistakes in this life. It is how we deal with these mistakes that makes us who we are.
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Mrs. Dreamland,<p>I am in no way better than you. Remember that God does not see us this way, and neither do I. You know that Jesus told the pharisees that even lusting after a women is like committing adultery. Why did he say this? He gave this as an example of how we should see other people not for what they do, but for what is in the heart. When I see your heart, I see a wonderful caring beautiful woman. Hurt by her actions. I see nothing else. I know you did not wish to hurt me. I know none of this was intentional, even though at times I feel that I deserved for you to have an affair for the way I treated you. I have fully forgiven you for what you have done and for whatever you plan to do. My love for you is not based on how or what you do for these are feelings that grow or fade. Certainly I believe we should have strong feelings for each other and we are working on that now. That is as simple as demonstrating the love we have in our hearts for each other. That is what all of this EN's is about. Learning to love each other. Without the love, all the EN meeting is just empty actions and worse manipulation is some circumstances.<p>I understand that you are entitled to this feeling and I am in no way judging you for this feeling. I am only trying to tell you that you do not have to feel this way. However, this feeling demonstrates how you are such a great woman. You realize that your actions were wrong and you feel guilty for what you have done. If you read the posts out there, unfortunately most WS do not feel this way. I am very blessed to have you for my wife.<p>I know the majority of the people that have affairs fall into these. They are not looking for love elsewhere. They are only looking for their needs to be met. Getting their needs met on the surface does not feel wrong. After all, each person may be genuinly trying to help each other with no desire to make it anything than that. (Except in this case I think the OM was interested very early on.) Soon each person begins having feelings for each other and the rest is history. Many have said that here that the A is not the cause of the problems in the marriage it is only a sympton.<p>Lots of luv to you wafer,
DL