Coach,

Again, welcome back and I too liked the poodle story. Jake is a poodle?

For those criticizing you for walking off the dance floor, might I say that after getting hit with that blast of poison, one's mind is not thinking of the "Miss Manners" way to finish off the night...but to get away from the pain and chaos in the most direct way possible.

Those relative and friends there who love you and know you need no apology...but maybe a small explaination!

k

I came home tonight from the office…to be greeted by a woman who seems to be in a quiet state of hysteria. Strange way to describe her I know but I can’t find other words to use…Her mood swings and the patterns of how she’s communicating seem to be jumping off in 10 different directions…from one moment to the next.

When I returned to Miami at the end of last week…there were no overt signs or displays of anger or hostility…not by either of us. For me…it was a feeling of resignation…that is…me resigned to the fact that this was really the only way out…divorce. In the one telephone conversation that we had…while I was running…chasing after my sanity…I told her that I saw no way out for me…for us…that love had nothing to do with it any more…not for me…and obviously not for her.

Not for me, because I simply refuse to live the rest of my life knowing that she will at some future date…do something similar or worse once again. And not because she doesn’t love me…because I’m truly convinced that she does love me…but because she is wired so differently…that her standards of behavior are dictated by different values…and she honestly can’t see that these little vacations from the marriage…that she is prone to take from time to time…are or should be…that important to me…not in the larger scheme of things…as she sees it.

She honestly seems baffled…she swears that she didn’t have sex with the Prof…and honestly can’t comprehend why I am taking such a strident attitude about what she did do…something that while she understands might make me angry…or may disappoint me…was just not that serious…or at least not serious enough to warrant my current response…and because she is so injured and so hurt by my response in this matter…I keep breaking my own damn rules…I keep trying to explain…

And when I do…all I get back from her is “but you’re wrong!”…”But I didn’t even really do anything!”…As if to say that she was short changed in the deal…that her @ss is picking up the check for something she never bought…and swears that she was not ever even in the market for.

And so the conversation goes round and round in circles…and I find myself debating the minutia…rather then the crux of the problem. She admits to breaking our covenant… (How can she deny it?)…She has no choice but to own up to it, LOL…it’s a written document that spells everything out…yet…she sees this breach as some minor infraction…and she sees me as some lunatic over reacting to the situation…extracting a level of punishment from her that doesn’t fit the crime…but the kicker is…she’s not even willing to make promises as to her future behavior…Because she admittedly can’t be sure what the ground rules are that she needs to live up too! It’s my fault! Hello…does this sound familiar to any one?

And this woman…that I love so much…then looks at me…eyes filled with disbelief…that I am actually serious…that I am actually about to dissolve over 29 years of marriage…because of what?...Because she thinks it’s just fine to have secret relationships with other men…and to sleep with them…if not in the same bed then in the same room…house…apartment…or whatever? Because she thinks it’s no big deal to have secret flirtations…private jokes…and intimate conversation…about matters outside the realm of what she feels is or should be my concern?...Or because of an errant kiss or two… (yes she admits to at least that level of physical contact…as well as places his hands might have strayed to…”but for only just a brief moment…honestly”).

But then in the same breath…she proclaims…”I’ll never do it again…ever…with any one…”…after admitting a minute earlier that she couldn’t possibly make any such promise…in that she could never really know what I might find objectionable….hello! Am I crazy or just on my way to getting there?

And when I try to make her understand…that I can’t…no make that won’t…continue living my life as a police officer…sitting in judgment of her every action…that I refuse to constantly live with worry…concerning her definition of appropriate behavior with which I expect my wife to conduct her life…she can’t understand why I should have any such problem.

So here we are together…two so called adults…crazy in love with each other…still…after 29 years…but unable to be together any longer…because she can’t grasp the single…simple…concept…that she’s killing me…that I’m honest and truly… literally dying!...That when something like this happens…when she does this kind of thing…I just want to be dead…that I now won’t be able to live with out anxiety and fear…of what else she might do…has already done…might consider doing in a moment of whimsy…for years to come…all over again…just like it was 7 years ago.

And she won’t consider that I’m serious!...Papers in hand…she won’t hire an attorney…refuses to believe that I’m serious…wants nothing else…other then to make love with me…and there is no anger, yelling or hostility…no harsh words…nothing mean being said…I try to sleep in the other room…she follows me…if I threaten to leave…she threatens to find me…no matter where I run too…and to never leave me…and I adore her! I just adore her! But she is toxic…I know that given another chance she will kill more of me…not because she’s malicious or intends to hurt or injure…because this is who she has become. When did this happen? How did this happen? Where did this woman come from?

I am truly at a loss…

Coach

Thanks Coach, I am glad I am not the only one.

Yep.......as sad as that is, you have the crux of the issue nailed down. Many people will scream and rationalize this point till the cows come home, but they eventually learn the hard way. As much as people want it to all be about "meeting needs" or filling the "love bank", sometimes you have to accept that people...are who they are.

Sour.....

If "nothing" happened, then it was an accident that "nothing" happened, because she doesn't have clear boundaries and has a dennis-the-menace-with-his-hand-in-the-cookie-jar mentality.

If you hadn't caught her, there would likely have been a follow-up assignation, where things would have intensified. Then "something" -- something besides gropes and kisses, that is -- would have "happened."

You're right. You don't want to spend the rest of your life grilling her about what "something" and "nothing" is. Where his hand was, where her tongue was... wondering what her smirks are about.

Did you read my last post on my own thread? One of the important things that I learned in the last two years is, as Sholom Aleichem put it, "A fish may love a bird, but where would they build a home together?" Sometimes the most beautiful person in the world is just not someone you can live with -- that you can love, but you have to honor the limits.

And I frankly admit I'm jealous of your wife -- even if she is a publicist -- because she has a loving husband.

Now that she's seen the damage that has come from her "whimsical" moments, and that you have been put in a position to enforce the boundaries you set with her 7 years ago, she's gone into overdrive to try to manipulate you into yet another "chance" at making things "work out". Hence the desire for lovemaking and following you around the house.

Is there any chance she's bipolar?

Coach, I am sorry you find yourself in this place at this time of your life. It's just really sad. However, I think you have summed it up perfectly in your last post, and the path for you to take is clear. Take the path, knowing that you have paid the price, done the work, put in the effort, and in spite of your efforts, your WW just doesn't "get it". Not now, maybe not ever.

You deserve better, you deserve a chance to live without the fear and doubt your current situation is never going to be without. Go with a clear mind and conscious(sp?), and live life without lamenting what you are leaving behind. Surround yourself w/people you can trust, and friends that are true. You won't regret it.

Best wishes,
SD

I feel for you Coach, I really do.

I had to come to the same conclusion in my situation. Probably the most painful one of all, that she just won't change.
No matter how important it is. No matter how much it is needed. No matter how much we beg God or whoever. It just won't happen.

Coach,

Have you thought about just giving her this single post of yours that explains what you feel and why and let her read it, in her own time and space? It really might help her, she might receive the information better as you have phrased it here than be word of mouth.

It is truely a sad thing and I wish she would "get it", but you cannot make or educate her, you can simply tell her how you feel.

God Bless,

JL

I woke up this morning more tired then when I went to bed. And of course she was there...wrapped around me...and you all know that I loved it...know make that I love it!...And I laid there and wondered how I could possibly live the rest of my life not having this. And all night all she kept crying for was a second chance...a second chance!?...She doesn't even realize that what she's asking for is a THIRD chance!

Coach

I imagine she must be very desperate. Sounds like she is the kind of woman used to being able to control her own domain, and write her own rules. And now she is flipping out because someone is telling her, no.

She wants to keep you and keep the lifestyle that she has become used to. The one where she calls the shots and keeps the control by using secrecy and lies. She pretended to practice the art of compromise in marriage, but what she really practiced was the art of deception.

I can see how you would wonder what else she's done over the years, and what she might be capable of in the future. It's so tough to be married a long, long time and realize that your values are very different from the person that you're married to.

Don't let her succeed in making you crazy...her behavior certainly sounds crazymaking. Sounds like she is scrambling to cover her @ss. You have her pegged.

Can't really believe a word she says...how could it be proved? A lie detector test? Sometimes I wish it were so easy. I hate lies. She seems to be saying whatever she thinks will work to manipulate you into not D'ing so she can resume her life within her comfort zone.

I know there are no easy answers. I do understand how you still love your wife. We will be married 29 yrs this coming Sunday. I don't know for sure that my H won't try and do something again someday. I do know he 'gets it' though. He says he is sure of his commitment to our marriage. I can't see how there would be any excuse he could use another time.

I wonder how you will actually be able to separate from her since you are enjoying some of her making up to you at the moment. Will you get a D and then continue on as if you weren't? How will you move on. Guess it is all so early in this.

Coach

as you dropped back in I had a read..a long read.

You know, something struck me about your description of your wifes behaviour.
I'm not trying to be smart here at all but I really wonder if you have SERIOUSLY considered she may be bi-polar and has been for some years.

Its just being so close to all this what you see as willful inconsiderate deliberate action may, only may I'm saying be the product of something else.

Now I know nothing other than the limited training I got to report certain types of behaviour and well, she seems to fit a bit into the mould. Of course it may simply be the way you have written here.

You may want to have that investigated though.

And I dont care what anyone else says if you end up wanting to stay with her well you do it.
Loves prety rare in this world mate.

She could be hormonally challenged.

* threadjack warning *


Hi Trix! 29 years this coming Saturday for us. What a path we have traveled. Congratulations!

Coach, you won't wake up with her wrapped around you every day for the rest of your life. It will get back to status quo, that's for sure.

Unless, she has a plan besides *saying* she will never do it again.

Susan

Aussie,

Thanks for your post. I am currently in the same situation as Coach except for the marriage of his daughter and her role. My wife has just ended an EA that just last night she admitted was "wrong". Wrong was her exact word, first time I heard it.
I have come to the realization that WS are not doing it to the BS as much as they are doing it to themselves. About 15 years ago I had a one night stand. My wife knows about it as I told her very soon after it happened. I remember the war that was going on in my head when I did it. I knew it was wrong before I did it, but my mind rationalized it as ok in that it would make the hurt I felt go away and no one would know anyway. WRONG. I forgot that I would know. I was not trying to hurt my wife as much as I was trying to make myself feel better. Made my mind up at that point that it was way more hurt for myself than I ever wanted to experience again and yes I did love my wife when I did it. Actually, my one night stand was the most hurt I have ever felt including my wife affairs. When ever we do something that is against our better moral judgement, and we have all done these things to a much lesser degree than an affair, we cause ourselves pain. That is what creates the guilt and strips away our self esteem. Our pride prevents us from seeing this in our WS. Making these life decisions regarding saving/ending our marriages are decisions that should be made without our pride involved. Our WS's affairs are not as much an attack on us but an attack on themselves only they do not know it. They know it is painfull but do not know why, the only explanation for the hurt they feel is the BS, hence the fog.

Coach, you need to do what is right for you and only you.
Do not let pride get in the way. Pride only seperates you from the Creator and his power of insight and ability to help solve your problems. Take your time making your decision, you have plenty of time to make a final decision.

Thank you, Susan. Congradulations and best wishes to you and your H too!

If one succumbs to the honeymoon emotions following these emotional traumas we could all stay addicted to the drama and chaos for that pay off. (how sweet it was...) It does all settle down again.

So, what is she really offering as a plan?...good question.

The plans were in place with the covenant before her latest EA/PA(?) now she is trying to turn it around and accuse Coach of not following the plan. Sheesh.

Coach,

I think TruBluz has the right idea;

""She wants to keep you and keep the lifestyle that she has become used to.""

She is in a total panic!! Seeing herself living alone with all friends and family knowing why. So NOW she is cramming your love bank to overflow.

Sometimes I think that is why Geeze dropped the OM like a hot rock when I found out.

k

""Or because of an errant kiss or two… (yes she admits to at least that level of physical contact…as well as places his hands might have strayed to…”but for only just a brief moment…honestly”).""

Reminds me of Pres Clinton saying "I DID NOT HAVE SEXUAL RELATIONS WITH THAT WOMAN" Yeah, and I only had one glass of wine at the party last night....

k

Why do I get the sneaky feeling you're going to back down?

Coach, it's not that hard to sleep separately, move out, etc., if that's what you've really decided to do. This is torturing her. Why are you doing it?

Is this some attempt to make her "pay" before you back down and forgive? Is this part of some elaborate, customary dance before reconciliation? I'm asking, not telling. Just the way it looks from the outside.

Your choice, as always, coach. But be aware of what's happening. Don't be fooled by yourself.

Coach,

This is your most vulnerable time. YOUR vulnerable time. When she is asking for another 'chance', is she being specific or general? Pay attention to what and how she is asking. WS' c/b very calculating.

Remember the bulk of the recovery is on her plate not yours. You have the luxury of making the choice now not her. She gets to live with your decision.

Not to put you in a powerseat or anything like that but that is what it really boils down to. Sit back and listen carefully to what she has to say but don't jump to hasty conclusions. More of the story may bubble forth.

Be careful.

L.