PBL1:

To my dear XXX

In my life I have love you with all my heart, and my commitment to you and I believed our marriage was unending. I have always been so proud of you – proud of you as my wife, proud of the woman you are. You have always been a wonderful mother and my respect for you runs deeper than you will ever know.

I am so sorry that I find myself in this place that is so painful for me. Until September, I did not fully understand how truly miserable you were. I didn’t realize how my inability to show my respect for you had affected you. I hadn’t realized how much you needed the house to be clean, for me to be a stronger parent – instead of relying on you to carry that load. I truly did not understand the selfish way that I approached our life together, and I didn’t understand how that affected you. I didn’t know how to properly show the love that I felt for you. I foolishly did all the same mistakes that I saw as a child. I foolishly undermined your efforts; I didn’t back you up when I should have. I didn’t protect you – from myself. I didn’t understand what your needs truly were, and how I could meet those needs in order for our marriage to grow.

I have done a lot of soul-searching over the past several months and look forward to a lot more work on myself in the future. I believe I have found the tools that we need to make our marriage one that is joyful, loving, and supportive. I have made many changes in my life over the past few months; I will continue to do so for as long as it takes. Some of these changes you may have noticed, some you may have not. I have to continue with these changes, and I’ve demonstrated to myself that it’s possible and that they can be permanent. I still have a lot of work to do, but with every success I have, the hope for my future brightens and I have confidence in my ability to make positive changes. My hope is to be able to share these changes with you in our future.

As my hope for the future increases, so does my sorrow over my loss our marriage. But what is worse is that I find my love for you is dying – I’ve lost so much love and respect for you for your affair that the pain has become more than I can bear. I have to do something to preserve what is left in the hopes that there may be something left should you change your mind about our marriage. I have to do something to stop this bitterness and pain from overwhelming me. I have to remove myself from contact with you – I cannot accept phone calls, text messages, instant messages, or personal visits from you. I have to avoid seeing you and speaking with you. I have to give myself a fresh start in a positive environment. I am not doing this to hurt you, dear XXX. This is to safeguard what love I have left for you so that if there comes a time when we can both commit to working on rebuilding our marriage, there is still the love and hope within me to do that.

If you need to contact me, please do so through Ron.

XXX, I know I could help have a wonderful marriage if we both committed to making it happen. I’ve learned so much in the past few months and I’d love to share it with you - should there come a time when you feel you could commit to trying to build a new life with me. It is something I’d like to discuss with you but there have to be some things that must happen first:

1) There can be no contact until I am sure there is absolutely no contact with OM, including a letter written to him that we both author and send to him explaining our desire.
2) It also would include Marriage Counseling.

My hope is that you will think about this and choose this commitment. I would welcome a discussion with you about it. Until then, I ask that you respect my wish for no contact with you.

I consider you to be my best friend, wife, and lover, and I am having a hard time imagining a life without you.

I love you

David

PBL2:

To my dear XXX

In my life I have love you with all my heart, and my commitment to you and I believed our marriage was unending. I have been so proud of you – proud of you as my wife, proud of the woman you are. You have been a wonderful mother and my respect for you runs deeper than you will ever know.

I am so sorry that I find myself in this place that is so painful for me. Until September, I did not fully understand how truly miserable you were. I didn’t realize how my inability to show my respect for you had affected you. I hadn’t realized how much you needed the house to be clean, for me to be a stronger parent – instead of relying on you to carry that load. I truly did not understand the selfish way that I approached our life together, and I didn’t understand how that affected you. I didn’t know how to properly show the love that I felt for you. I foolishly did all the same mistakes that I saw as a child. I foolishly undermined your efforts; I didn’t back you up when I should have. I didn’t protect you – from myself. I didn’t understand what your needs truly were, and how I could meet those needs in order for our marriage to grow.

I have done a lot of soul-searching over the past several months and look forward to a lot more work on myself in the future. I believe I have found the tools that we need to make our marriage one that is joyful, loving, and supportive. I have made many changes in my life over the past few months; I will continue to do so for as long as it takes. Some of these changes you may have noticed, some you may have not. I have to continue with these changes, and I’ve demonstrated to myself that it’s possible and that they can be permanent. I still have a lot of work to do, but with every success I have, the hope for my future brightens and I have confidence in my ability to make positive changes. My hope is to be able to share these changes with you in our future.

As my hope for the future increases, so does my sorrow over my loss our marriage. But what is worse is that I find my love for you is dying – I’ve lost so much love and respect for you from your affair that the pain has become more than I can bear. I have to do something to preserve what is left in the hopes that there may be something left should you change your mind about our marriage. I have to do something to stop this bitterness and pain from overwhelming me. I have to remove myself from contact with you – I cannot accept phone calls, text messages, instant messages, or personal visits from you. I have to avoid seeing you and speaking with you. I am not doing this to hurt you, dear XXX. This is to safeguard what love I have left for you so that if there comes a time when we can both commit to working on rebuilding our marriage, there is still the love and hope within me to do that.

If you need to contact me, please do so through Ron.

XXX, I know I could help have a wonderful marriage if we both committed to making it happen. I’ve learned so much in the past few months and I’d love to share it with you - should there come a time when you feel you could commit to trying to build a new life with me. It is something I’d like to discuss with you but there have to be some things that must happen first:

1) There can be no contact until I am sure there is absolutely no contact with OM, including a letter written to him that we both author and send to him explaining our desire.
2) It also would include Marriage Counseling.

My hope is that you will think about this and choose this commitment. If you are willing to work on it, I would welcome a discussion with you about it. Until then, I ask that you respect my wish for no contact with you.

I consider you to be my best friend, wife, and lover, and I am having a hard time imagining a life without you.

I love you

David

PBL3

To my dear XXX

In my life I have love you with all my heart, and my commitment to you and I believed our marriage was unending. I have been so proud of you – proud of you as my wife, proud of the woman you are. You have been a wonderful mother and my respect for you runs deeper than you will ever know.

I am so sorry that I find myself in this place that is so painful for me. Until September, I did not fully understand how truly miserable you were. I didn’t realize how my inability to show my respect for you had affected you. I hadn’t realized how much you needed the house to be clean, for me to be a stronger parent – instead of relying on you to carry that load. I truly did not understand the selfish way that I approached our life together, and I didn’t understand how that affected you. I didn’t know how to properly show the love that I felt for you. I foolishly did all the same mistakes that I saw as a child. I foolishly undermined your efforts; I didn’t back you up when I should have. I didn’t protect you or our family (including myself) – from this pain. Based on that, I didn’t understand what your needs truly were, and how I could meet those needs in order for our marriage to grow.

I have done a lot of soul-searching over the past several months and look forward to a lot more work on myself in the future. I believe I have found the tools that we need to make our marriage one that is joyful, loving, and supportive. I have made many changes in my life over the past few months; I will continue to do so for as long as it takes. Some of these changes you may have noticed, some you may have not. I have to continue with these changes, and I’ve demonstrated to myself that it’s possible and that they can be permanent. I still have a lot of work to do, but with every success I have, the hope for my future brightens and I have confidence in my ability to make positive changes. My hope is to be able to share these changes with my wife in our near future.

As my hope for the future increases, so does my sorrow over my loss our marriage. But what is worse is that I find my love for you is dying – I’ve lost so much love and respect for you from your affair that the pain has become more than I can bear. What I must do now is preserve that is left of my love for you as my wife. I have to stop this bitterness and pain from overwhelming me. I must remove myself from contact with you – I cannot accept phone calls, text messages, instant messages, or personal visits from you. I have to avoid seeing you and speaking with you. I am not doing this to hurt you, dear XXX. This is to safeguard what love I have left for you so that if there comes a time when we can both commit to working on rebuilding our marriage, there is still the love and hope within me to do that.

For now, you will get responses from me on the following items: money, the kid’s visitations, your mail, etc. If you need to contact me, please do so through Ron.

XXX, I know I could help have a wonderful marriage if we both committed to making it happen. I’ve learned so much in the past few months and I’d love to share it with you - should there come a time when you feel you could commit to trying to build a new life with me. It is something I’d like to discuss with you but there have to be some things that must happen first:

1) There can be no contact until I am sure there is absolutely no contact with OM, including a letter written to him that we both author and send to him explaining our desire.
2) It also would include Marriage Counseling.

My hope is that you will think about this and choose this commitment. If you are willing to work on it, I would welcome a discussion with you about it. Until then, I ask that you respect my wish for no contact with you.

I would like to one day consider you to be my best friend, wife, and lover. Our family misses their mom and I miss my dear wife.

David

David, I really like #1. That is a very well written letter and you hit all the pertinent points.

Thanks Melody - I liked that one too, but felt I'd better give it several shots just to see if I could make things clear.

And thanks CJ - that first one was mainly due to your critiques. Unless anyone else objects, I am delivering that one today.

Be back on to suffer later (=

David