What exactly do you think she is doing, she says that she wants the divorce to end this chapter of her life.

How do you respond when she talks to you about the divorce? YOU JUST LISTEN!

Gaboy, every question doesn't require an answer. Most questions don’t even deserve to be answered!…So you don’t answer them! You listen to them with attention and courteous interest and say nothing!

You do not dispute, argue or debate the issue at which the question was directed or intended to clarify. You instead, simply listen and accept the question as information.

If you feel forced to respond…due to a hostile attack from the person asking the question…you equivocate! That is you respond with, things like, “I don’t know I haven’t spoken to the lawyer yet.” Or “my lawyer hasn’t called me.” Or things like “let me think about it.” You respond in effect by saying nothing.

What you don’t do is loose your temper, argue, debate, beg, plead, cry or ask her to reconsider. All you do is listen! Don’t force any issue with her and don’t push her to speak with you. Be patient but when given the opportunity to speak or be with her, be pleasant and non-confrontational. Be her island of calm. The safe place she can come. The place where she will not be criticized, preached to, or made demands of.

This works.

coach

Coach I am sorry to bombard you with so many questions, has this same thing happened to you?

What did you do @ first and what happened?

Yes, essentially I was in the same sitch as you only I tend to think that mine was a little worse. But then every BS that ever lived feels that there’s was by far the worst sitch ever! LOL I was helped along by SH but in the end it was me who had to realize that facts sometimes have noting to do with reality. My W’s reality was that she wanted to have sex with my ex-best friend and stay married to me at the same time.

Your reality is a WW that sounds as if she’s the focus of to much love and attention. A woman confused by her feelings of entitlement. But it doesn’t really matter does it because the thing is, that no matter what the scenario, there seems to be great sameness when it comes to infidelity and cheating. Major points that seem to always be present in all of these cases? Selfishness. Selective listening. Lying. Rationalization.

So your wife says she wants a divorce, so what? The woman is not in her right mind at the moment so why worry about anything she is saying? She’s nuts right now so why are you treating her like she is a rational human being? Why do you take her seriously? Why would you dignify her insanity by giving it the credibility of a serious argument?

When confronted with a crazy, you don’t argue with them, you humor them. And so that’s what I learned to do. I became as indispensable to my wife as the only solid place for her to hang onto that the thought of me leaving became her own personal place of terror. And I milked it dry with my own personal brand of human kindness and marketed that dispensability to her…and thus stuck it to her! And all I really had to do was learn to listen. Amazing!

Coach

Well do you think she will come out of it before the D could be final or after.

Another scenario is what if she realized that she really doesnt love me and she made a mistake in marrying me but like I said when all of this come out she had bought wicker furniture for the front porch. I dont think she had no intentions of leaving me or even telling me about the A or she might have stopped it and never told me. I do know that @ 4:00 the next morning she called him and made several phone calls to him during that peroid. I dont know now she changed her cell phone number so I dont see the bill

I know i am trying to make sense of nothing, I think too deep

Mike,
As much as I would like to see you and Cindy repair the damage done to each other and go on together to make this marriage work, I have to tell you that the strong pragmatic side of me keeps yelling, (not whispering mind you but YELLING!) take the job in Florida. Get out while the getting is good!

So many advantages to moving down here but most important, it would be a so much easier and better life for you and the kids. And if Cindy can’t deal with that reality then for me, it would be just too bad.

From where I’m standing, it‘s time for Cindy to bite the bullet and put her self out a little bit. And if she decided not to come along, well that would be a deal breaker for me. Sorry, Mike, in this particular instance I don’t believe she deserves your willingness to compromise.
Coach

Coach I think that you replied to the wrong post

Gaboy,
LOL, yes I did respond to the wrong post! Sorry, I had been jumping back and forth between you and Mike (also in real pain) and posted my message to him on your thread.

My feelings about where you are falls into the realm of you learning to fashion a plan to pro-actively deal with a situation over which you have no control. My feeling is that if you would just take a huge step back and first get some control over yourself, then everything else would fall into some kind of order. Your situation would then become manageable. As it is now, you’re exploding out in so many different directions that all you are communicating is “needy” and “chaos;” both very unattractive attributes.

And you’re right, you are thinking too much! But that’s not the problem. The problem is that your projecting your thoughts and feelings toward her. If you could just stop yourself from communicating your insecurities and instead create an aura of calm, then she would probably come to you with her feelings…You want to become a resource for her…a place to come for help. A place she can find help to heal herself…and isn’t that what love is really all about? Being selfless enough to consider her needs first? But as things are presently, you are just another problem in her mix…and so she doesn’t want to deal with you or your feelings…so she runs!

Make no mistake. What I’m suggesting you do is very difficult. That’s why reconciliation is not for the faint of heart. It’s not some natural process that will take place on its own. It requires work, effort and a selfless kind of determination that very few have. To many folks around here are fond of talking about change; all the changes they’ve suddenly made in themselves that are suppose to make them more attractive but when you boil it all down what you have are a few cosmetic efforts dressed up in talk, talk, talk. And bro, there comes a time when all of us simply have to learn that talking don’t make it so…doing it makes it so! You can’t talk it, you have to live it. And the beginning to it all, at least for me, was learning how to really listen and keep my big mouth shut.

Coach

So tonight when I talked to her our relationship got brought up and she said that when she wanted to talk to me she would call me and said bye and hung up. I wanted so bad to call her back. I think that I will feverishly wait for her to call me.

Any other posters have sorta the same situation with a success story and how they done it. Once again I am looking for a quick fix which I know will not happen. I really need to control myself, but this is all I can think about

Here's a thought. How about not phone her at all. And when she phones, let your answerphone pick it up. Try it for a few days. It's a way to start disconnecting from her pulling your chain. You're acting like a little dog, waiting to be kicked.

So I should not call her until she calls me, but I am thinking that she will never call. I am such a pessimist.

Take the chance. At least for a couple days. See what happens. Leave it till, say, Tuesday. Talk to us, instead.

Think of it as a game you're playing. Not with her, but with yourself. Like daring yourself to do something.

Remember, if she phones you -- let the answering machine deal with it. You don't pick up.

Bet you can't do it! Prove me wrong.

But I feel that if I dont call her she will become comfortable with her decison to divorce. I often wonder if she has finally relized that if she had an affair because she really didnt love me and now she wants out

Don't worry about that now. You can't find out about her "real" feelings. She doesn't know herself how she feels.

The bigger danger is that you are going to driving her away by whining, pleading, and begging.

Let her wonder where you are. Let her see that you have a life of your own. Let her wonder if she can get YOU back.

I'm not talking about playing games, here. Really start having a life. Don't be the little dog following her around and whimpering. It's very unattractive.

Yes, she may file for divorce anyway. There really isn't much you can do to stop her. But you can take the pressure off her. Don't force her hand right now. Give her some breathing space.

As you know, your marriage is in serious jeopardy right now anyway. Do Plan A when she lets you -- but only when she lets you. Don't fight her. Don't follow her.

And start getting a headstart on the rest of your life -- for whatever happens. I know it's hard. Believe me I know.

Okay see we have been together for 10 years this July and our second wedding anniversary will be in Oct. She started this affair after only 6 months after we got married. Is it possible to save this marriage? I often wonder

Don't wonder. Go jogging. As anyone on the boards will tell you -- 6 months, 60 years, affairs are affairs and they follow roughly the same script.

Even though you're in Plan A (think Cary Grant, "Philadelphia Story"), you do have to work on YOU as much as if you were in Plan B, since she is not in the house right now. Don't brood or worry. And don't phone. And don't answer the phone.

Are you going to win the bet?

GB
please listen to this advice ..it does work..I know. it was done to me!!!

Ok I didn't leave the home, but I thought it was all over NOTHING could be done to save our M I had stuffed it up to much was my thinking and I was not going to talk about it and tell my H any details .nothing.

So he ignored it, always HAD to go somewhere or do something - he was living HIS life, that I started to think where was he, what is he doing, he always listened but said little, then I started to obsess where he was .... I became so jealous I'm sure when I posted here that they must have been smiling [well probably laughing their heads off] at me ... THATS when it hit me like a ton of bricks ..I WANTED my M mY H and I would fight for them & not just talk about it.
Thats what my H was waiting for ... and its been hard GABOY more than you would think. Not going to bore you with that side of things ..yet - LOL - but just so you know ..YES IT DOES WORK. I can't promise it WILL work only that its a lot better than you are doing now.

Listen to A M Martin's recommendation above, its a darn good one...follow it ..& when you feel that urge to ring your WW bite your tongue ..HARD & go out for a run or the gym .. and DONT be at her beck & call ..got a ans machine? put a happy message on it ..Hi I'm out living my life right now & having fun ...blah blah ..if she rings and leaves a message ring her back ..later ..a lot later and let her talk..you do the a ha, mmmmm, & yeah's ... dont get involved in arguements just excuse yourself and say you have to go you have an appointment with friends whatever.

Just move back a bit GABOY .... you CAN do it!!

Praying for you.

Last night thought I should not have I text her good night and she wrote me back and said whatever, i then wrote her back and asked her why she said that, she jokingly said to piss you off because I am good at it. Sorta like she was playing and joking. Then she said goodnight for tonight. I hope she really comes around, I am not gonna call her until she calls me

Another question how can I meet her EN when I dont see her and show her I love her. She did say that she needed her space does that mean she is still talking to the guy? I did get her cell phone records and there hasnt been any calls now for 3 weeks. No she doesnt have another cell phone and she isnt using a calling card because she had so many calls on her cell phone bill 3 weeks ago