It's a valid worry...I know. And I know EXACTLY how you feel with wanting to do what you can to comfort her. The first week of withdrawl, my wife and I both slept in the living room...her on the couch, me on the loveseat. And she cried herself to sleep every night...and all I could do was lay there and listen to it.

She couldn't/wouldn't accept any kind of consolation from me, as she felt that would be a betrayal to the OM (I know, it bothered me too, but it was how she felt at the time).

All I can suggest is that you do your best to Plan A...support her as best as you can, and continue to fight to keep NC in place.

The weekend...

This last weekend was our best so far since D-day. Friday night my W was feeling quite caged and frustrated with the demands of the children. She needed a break, so I let her go out for a couple of hours by herself with the understanding that there was to be no contact with the OM. She asked what time I would like her to be home and we agreed on 9 - 10:00.

At 9:00 she called to tell me that one of her girlfriends had invited us to attend a local festival with fireworks. My DS and I met up with them at the festival and we had a great time. I was more comfortable with her being out than I have been in months and I told her that she had begun to earn back trust points because of her hard work and willingness to account for her whereabouts at all times.

After returning home and putting everyone to bed we had a chance to talk and I asked how her evening went. She said she just drove around and did a lot of thinking. It was at this point that a seed that I planted started to take root. She said she was hurt that the OM had not come outside to protect/defend her on D-day. She felt that if he had cared about her as much as she thought he did that he would have protected her.

I mean I was really upset and yelling and how did he know that I wouldn't harm her? But he never came out. Then she mentioned the point that I made a week or so ago, that in spite of what he may have said, he really did not have as much to lose in the A. He has no wife, his young son does not live with him, etc. He made a big deal about how hurt his parents would be, but as I told my W, parents forgive their children almost anything; wouldn't we for our children. So she felt that she was coming to the painful realization that the A may not have meant as much to him as it did to her. She feels stupid, foolish and used. It was a very good talk and I really felt like a corner had been turned.

We went on to have a wonderful day Saturday planning to redecorate our DS's room. On Sunday she went with me on a long motorcycle ride (which she has never done before) and we had a great time. I don't think of myself as having a strong need for recreational companionship, but it was really good to have her with me.

Sunday night we talked about our sexual relationship. Our closeness and good communication over the weekend had left me in an amorous mood. She declined, leading to another discussion about our sexual relationship. (A recurring issue in our marriage the last few years.)

This was painful for me because I learned that one of her high priority emotional needs is to have a physically fit spouse; and I am not. I have over the years not taken care of myself as I should have and have gained a substantial amount of weight. She expressed that she never wanted to nag me about it, feeling that it was not her place and that, as one who struggles with weight herself, it would be hypocritical. (BTW, I have never found her weight to be a problem and have never felt any need to say anything to her about it.)

There were many tears shed by me as this was very painful to hear. The irony being that the sexual relationship is important to me (high need for Sexual Fulfillment) and that I have done a lot of damage through my own actions/inactions. She feels very badly that she had to say this to me and believes that it makes her shallow and hypocritical to feel this way. I told her that it does not and that it was important that we discuss these things. I even allowed that, not blaming her and making it her fault, but had I known how important it was to her I might have made a better effort in the past.

The good news is that I know now how important this is to her. She has expressed an important emotional need that she had not expressed before. And while I had already begun a new diet program and have lost several pounds over the last 4 weeks, I have a renewed motivation. I understand now that it is important to her, not just for the obvious reasons of physical appearance, but because she wants me to be healty, to be there for her and the children for many years.

She told me how much she loves me and that if she did not believe that we could overcome this and our other issues that she would not be there.

Overall it was our best weekend in months. We really talked and, although some of it was painful, we were finally being honest with each other about some of our needs and feelings. I hope that my distress about our conversation last night does not turn into reluctance on her part to continue sharing her needs and feelings with me.

F4L

<img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

nice work!

Pep

It's been a while since I posted here. Although I haven't posted here in a while, I have been blogging about my continuing efforts to restore my marriage. Things are very much up and down. We have gone several weeks with things seeming to go smoothly and then something happens and it all feels like it will unravel again. There's more in my blog but here's the latest:

S went back east with her parents this weekend to visit her 21 y.o. brother. While there she went out drinking with her brother and some of his friends. She called on Saturday to tell me about it and to let me know that she had gotten drunk and called the OM to "****** him out". She said that she only reached his machine and let him a drunken message. She wanted to let me know before I discovered the call in her phone records (which I had stopped checking because things had been going pretty well).

I did not say much about it at the time. She felt stupid for doing it and was pretty frazzled from dealing with her parents all weekend. It's eating at me though and she will be back home tonight. It just seems such an immature thing to do. I mean, she's a 39 y.o. women who goes out with a bunch of college age guys, gets drunk and calls her lover to tell him what a [censored] he is. It's the kind of behavior you might expect from a 20-something but not a mature woman. Anyway, I checked her phone records and it wasn't just one phone call, but several spread over 2 hours. Even after what I assume were that calls where she left a message, she called repeatedly. Obviously she wanted very badly to speak with him directly. Check it out:

DATE CITY TIME NUMBER MINS
9/10/05 xxxxxxx, xx 12:19 AM ********** 1
9/10/05 xxxxxxxxxx, xx 12:13 AM ********** 1
9/10/05 xxxxxxx, xx 12:08 AM ********** 1
9/09/05 xxxxxxx, xx 10:47 PM ********** 4
9/09/05 xxxxxxx, xx 10:38 PM ********** 4
9/09/05 xxxxxxx, xx 10:24 PM ********** 1
9/09/05 xxxxxxx, xx 10:11 PM ********** 2

I'm also still pissed about last Saturday. We went to a concert together and S was just a ****** to me the whole time. It was obvious that she was pissed about something. She wouldn't walk near me; she complained about our seats; she complained about being carded at the beer garden (normally that would have made her day) and on and on. After the concert the first thing she said was, "I'm bored". I asked what she would like to do and offerred that we go have a drink somewhere. A pretty lukewarm reponse and no suggestions as to what she had in mind to do. Apparently I am supposed to read her mind and have all this ****** planned out with no input from her. Of course, if I guess wrong, as I did on our anniversary, I'll hear about it.

Anyway, I cried myself to sleep again last night. That's really getting old. I took off my wedding ring again. S still has not put hers back on even though I have told her that it hurts me that she does not wear it. Can she really have so little regard for my feelings? I guess so. We'll see if she even notices.

This whole thing about being pissed at the OM and wanting to ****** him out is really bugging me. She is so wrapped up in being pissed at him. She does not seem to see that it hurts me that she spends so much time thinking about him. She is so selfish.

I don't know what to do. Just when I think things are turning around and she is really getting back into our relationship, something like this phone call happens and all her selfish ****** starts back up. I'm feeling like a fool; like I should be seeing the writing on the wall. "She's just not that into me" to borrow a phrase.

Reply here or comment on my blog: http://squozenoranges.blogspot.com

Fool4Love