It's been a long rough past three weeks. Let me quickly update you somewhat. Husband left back in October. At first I believed there to be an emotional affair happening. I soon realized there were just issues more along the emotional needs area that was actually the problem. I've attended counseling, but husband refused to go with me. He did, however, go speak with my counselor alone one time. He's continued to say that he was NOT coming back to our home and basically that our marriage was over, however, he was always coming over to visit. He spent Christmas Eve here sleeping on the couch. Two weekends ago, his daughters wanted to stay at my house rather than go to his, he spent the Saturday night in the livingroom again so that his daughters could stay here and he could be with them.

A week ago, we got into a huge argument and I totally broke down. I think I broke every single rule of a Plan A there was to break. I cried, I yelled, I did it all. But, he finally started to talk to me. He saw my pain and saw how much I cared and he began to talk. This was on Friday. We agreed to have a conversation the following day. It was a great talk! He opened up to me and then said he hated it that I could get him to open up like that. We layed in each other's arms for the first time since he left in October. I cried.

After our talk, he called me Sunday night. I invited him to my counseling with me, but he didn't show up. He called me Tuesday night and we talked for an hour and he asked if he could bring his girls over Wednesday and spend the evening with me and my kids. After leaving Wednesday night, he called me late to tell me that it was snowing and to be careful going to work the next day. Then we talked Friday and he said he wanted to come over for the weekend.

So, this past weekend, he and his girls came and stayed the weekend with us. We were intimate for the first time since he left. We didn't do relationship talk at all even though I wanted to. We have a huge problem with communication.

Yesterday morning, I left a message inviting him once again to my counseling. He didn't show up, however, he came to my house just minutes after I returned home and once the kids were in bed, HE BROUGHT UP US TALKING ABOUT THINGS!!!! We didn't talk much as he somewhat clamps up and it takes him a while to share things, but he said that he was confused and scared our marriage would just return to the way it had been. We both agreed that our biggest obstacle is communication. We both tend to hold our feelings in to avoid conflict so rather than solving a problem or issue, it just continues and continues and we continue to be unhappy. We talked about how we could overcome this and I told him I still really believed that having a third party help us with dialogue and teaching us techniques of communication would be beneficial.

It then was getting late and we had been up very late on Sunday night, so he had to leave. We hugged for a long time and I cried and told him that I truly believed we have something special here if we can just get past these communication barriers. He said he agreed.

So, we're beginning to work at things, but we're both kind of lost on the communication thing and where to go.

If you have any articles or advice, please share with me.