</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I am making the assumption the your W gave up OM. If so, how did she handle withdrawal and how did you handle the withdrawal?
Does she post here?
Is your story still posted here?
How could you look at your wife, know what she did, still love her and still want to make love to her? What was her response?
I know these are intimate questions and if you don't want to answer, I understand.
JL and 2scared have been giving good advice on my other thread, but you and your wife have been exactally where I am today. Anything you can tell me to help me get through today and have it be a good day, a day for growth instead of defeat I would appreciate.
Thanks
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Waking Up - Oh my! Recap 2.5 years succinctly?!? Let me begin by trying to answer, at least in some measure, your questions. I'm sure it will be inadequate, but perhaps some of it will be helpful and may prompt more targeted thoughts and questions about your own situation.
1.
I am making the assumption the your W gave up OM. If so, how did she handle withdrawal and how did you handle the withdrawal? She did "give up" her affair and recomitted to the marriage, but it was not easy nor was it "quick." I'll let you read some of that struggle later when I give you some links at the end of this post.
She did not handle withdrawal well, by MY standard or preference, but she did handle it "a piece at a time." One of the hardest things for all sinners to accept is that THEY, not someone else, are responsible for sinning against God and to begin to make the changes, to turn from the sin and walk in obedience to God, to begin to heal. It is not instantaneous and it IS a struggle accepting forgiveness, starting out in a new direction, and to
begin to forgive oneself. For example, she threw out ALL things related to the affair, the photo "scrapbook", CD's, etc., IMMEDIATELY upon deciding to return home. A desire for, and rationalizations to maintain a "friendship" continued for a very long time. Contact continued for almost 2 years. Never yet have I ever been told about a contact or attempted contact by the OM or when she would go to meet him as "friends." But every time there was a contact, I had to "discover" it and I fell into a deep emotional pit, all the fears and feelings of hopelessness dropped like an anvil, and only by clinging to God's promises and the "lifeline" of simple obedience was I able to climb out of the pit. But it took 2-3 months each time and got progressively harder to do, until the final time when I simple told her that it was no longer that I "can't" do this anymore, but it was that I "won't" do this anymore. 2 years was enough. I thank God that she "heard" me that time (as she just told me about a month ago). Since that day I am unaware of any further contact, but I will never know I guess.
How did I handle the withdrawal. Sometimes well and sometimes not so well. I frankly got dangerously close a couple of times to "ending the fight" and throwing in the towel. I "handled it" by obedience to God regardless of how I was feeling (which was in the deepest and darkest of pits, or valley, if you will). I "handled it" by being committed, as my chosen user name indicates, to her
forever despite what she had done or what she was doing (as in the contacts) as long as I held out ANY hope that things could, or might, change.
As I told her the day she left "for good," she took with her "all of my love, all of my heart, and half of my soul." But I am also fully human and not God. I don't, and did not, have the strength on my own. When I "relied" on my own strength and reasoning, I was ready to toss in the marriage and remain in love with her but not married to her because the pain was too intense. That is why Philippians 4:13 means so much to me and has become my "life verse." God HAS all the strength and He makes it available to me IF I will accept it. God IS in control, even when I "can't see it" or "feel it." TRUST God, not my spouse or myself. OBEY God's commands whether I "feel like it or not."
The "cost" of following Christ is not always easy or pleasant or our emotional "first choice." But God IS faithful. God DOES know the future. God remains whether I am married or not, but HE IS a partner to our covenant and as we BOTH surrendered to HIS will, He worked amazing miracles of fortitude, healing, and love. His work continues. I wait patiently, learning as I go and as time "catches up to" the future that God knew "back then."
2.
Does she post here?No.
3.
Is your story still posted here? Yes. I will give you links to them as they are about 2.5 years old.
4.
How could you look at your wife, know what she did, still love her and still want to make love to her? What was her response?Short response....because I truly LOVE her, in sickeness and in health, for richer or for poorer, for better or for worse....until death do us part. But that does not mean that I had to remain married to her to still love her. The marriage would recover or fail based upon the willingness of both of us to surrender OUR will to God's will and to OBEY His commands. God is faithful to ALL of His promises and He is a part of our covenant of marriage. He is at the center and at the top of our marriage, or should be, and in returning Him to the "throne" of our marriage would result in a recovered and better marriage, for all the pain of the trial we had to endure.
How could I want to make love to her? First, because she was and is my Wife. Second, because it is my "duty" to satisfy her needs. Third, because making love for most men, or at least for me, is the major "HOW" we show or "prove" our love. Yes, it's a "male thing" I suppose, but women tend not to show their love BY the act of marriage but through the things that they do for their husbands, as a contrast.
Was it easy? No. Especially early in recovery. You need to really understand that most men, myself included, are VERY visually oriented. I cannot adequately explain to most women just how [/b]INTENSE[/b], vivid, full color, surround sound, dolby stereo-like, are the mental movies. Did you do this, that or the other? ALL the questions you can think of become turned into mental movies of unimaginable impact. "Crushing" is an understatement of gross proportions.
Do I ever still have questions or "movies?" Never when I am with her, but sometimes afterward. It is likely to be a scar that remains. But it's more a sense of "loss," of wishing it had never happened. But the intensity isn't there and it's less frequent BECAUSE we are essentially recovered, I DO believe her when she says "I love you." I trust her again, even though I am still distrustful when it comes to potential contact with the OM because I've never been told voluntarily about any contact. But we've only been at this 2.5 years and I went into it thinking it could take 6 years (the length of the affair). So I'm still waiting patiently and hopefully for full recovery as time and experience combine to "bury" the past with reality of TODAY.
Her response. Too many ups and downs to go into here. Suffice it to say that a couple of months ago she thanked me for believing in her, for waiting for her, and for "being there" for her. Simple, I know. But impossible to say when the "Fog" is still around. But it was "worth" the 2 year wait to hear it nonetheless.
5.
Anything you can tell me to help me get through today and have it be a good day, a day for growth instead of defeat I would appreciate.
Miracles happen when you are obedient to God. A truth I learned the hard way and am forever grateful to God for His patience with me.
I will give you the links to my first two posts now. They were "raw times" at the beginning. But hopefully they won't be to painful for you to read. Read the HOPE. The situation is NEVER HOPELESS when God is involved. I will also include a link to a post I began after we had been in recovery for 1 year.
I pray that you find hope and something useful for your situation in some of the postings.
First Thread Second Thread. Recovery begins. Forgive? Trust? Really? Has anything been learned in the past year? I also include the link to the following thread as something that might also be of help to you.
Withdrawal. What is it like & how to handle it from those who have experienced it. God bless.
