Uh oh! How did that happen? That doesn't sound good. It sounds like maybe you're saving it up for later.

Nope.

I'm not going to fight you. If you choose denial, then I will respect your right to choose it.

I hope you guys had a good session with the Harley's this am - it was this morning right?

I'm not trying to be obstinate...I'm really not. I keep trying on the denial thing, but it doesn't fit.

As I said before, it could be plain ignorance. If that is the case, I don't want to be ignorant, but I also don't want to just accept that I'm in denial if it doesn't feel true. I'm not sure what to do with that one.

I'm really not trying to be stubborn.

Thanks for asking, Dorry!

Yes, it was this morning, and you know what? We're not ready to share it yet.

Today we're just enjoying feeling close to each other.
It feels pretty wonderful to be basking in the warm glow of intimacy with my husband.

He sure is special.

awww - you never have to share it you don't want to <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> I am glad you are having a good close day my dear - you guys DESERVE it!

Couldn't stop myself from making a little list...

1) Wow.. that was nice to read :-)
2) See #1
3) Keep it up, would ya?!? :-)

I'm not trying to be obstinate...I'm really not. I keep trying on the denial thing, but it doesn't fit.

As I said before, it could be plain ignorance. If that is the case, I don't want to be ignorant, but I also don't want to just accept that I'm in denial if it doesn't feel true. I'm not sure what to do with that one.[/quote]

How far has "feeling" gotten you? If thats working for you, then that is your answer, and mine won't work for you.

It's no secret that I'm a very emotional, feely kind of person. I don't know another way to be.

I am, open-minded, however, and willing to explore another way.

I'm sorry. I guess I'm just not getting it. I want to.

By the way, how are you today? <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Have I told you lately that I appreciate your patience with me?

No you aren't open minded. You want recovery your way.

Marital recovery is not intuitive, and in fact, Dr Harley points out repeatedly that following your "feelings" about your marriage will get you into trouble.

Personal recovery isn't anymore intuitive.

In my opinion you are a very emotional person because you choose to allow your feelings to run your life. In fact, many of your feelings do not reflect reality because you have too many hurts and too many fears running the show.

These broken feelings are what has caused you to end up where you are today. But it's certainly your right to choose to attempt to feel your way into recovery.

I'd simply have to ask you (in a Dr Phil voice): How's that working for you?

You don't not-know how to be otherwise. You are choosing not to be otherwise. Pure and simple. It is simply a decision.

And if you still think I just don't understand you ~ let me point out that my personality type is an INFP . Ya don't get much more emotional and feely than that.

I'm sure it's no coincidence that I am an INFP, as well.




Maybe, but here I am...listening and trying to understand.



I want it ANY way. I HAVE made progress. I am willing to try to understand a different way, but it's foreign and I am having a very difficult time understanding.



I'm choosing what I know. How's it working for me? I don't know. I am making progress. If another way would offer more rapid progress, I'd sure be willing to give it a shot. I've asked question after question until I understand more of what you're saying. Some things I've grasped better than others, and am working to apply them, although it's a process and I don't expect to be perfect at it right off the bat. I'm ready and willing to practice until I get it right. But, I can't practice something I don't understand.

I'm struggling to understand, here. I want to.

I will toss out my opinion on this last post of yours. I certainly appreciate you taking the time to even talk about these things with froz.


Not true. She is open minded. Maybe not on ALL things, but who is. No matter how open-minded I make myself, I will never understand the need to rape a child(remember that discussion??) Well, that is close-minded isn't it? Or is it acceptable that I am not open to that and we can forego calling me close-minded because it is close-minded for a good cause. I don't see the value of satanism. Am I close minded to that? Anyway, not that I have made a point here, but I don't find her to be close-minded. Close-minded is the BS that is not trying to forgive. Close-minded is the BS that packs up and ships off without ever trying. Close-minded is the WS that never looks outside his own selfish shallowness to see other people. Or better yet... Close-minded is the person who is told a better way by an expert in the subject, and blows it off because they think they know better.

Froz is not close-minded. She has listened when told 'attacking me' (LBing) is not helping the situation no matter how much she wants to. Even in crying during a discussion, she still listens to me and takes what I have to say under consideration. I think that would be an instance of her being emotional and still finding the way to be open-minded.

Or maybe I missed the mark of your point?


I assume when you say 'intuitive' you mean like a software application is intuitive. It has built in designs that 'tell' you haw to work the program, so to speak. I would agree. Recovery is not intuitive. In fact, it is difficult. No wonder many people here don't achieve it. It is extremely difficult to try and compromise with a person that has cheated on you. I imagine she has thought "why should I do anything for him... he owes me for all this pain" But.... she has not truly done that. She has always been on the look-out for and inquisitive of tools and tactics for navigating this 'recovery' so that the end is 'better happier marriage' and not 'see ya, would want to be with ya'


I agree with this idea. She has had many feelings or emotions that have made decisions for her. But, coupled with that, she has had the most horrid pain from all of this and is probably not running on all 8 cylinders all the time.

I told her I loved her. She didn't feel it. So, I guess your remark was true about her not living in reality. The reality was I love her. She did not 'feel' it. But, recovery is as much about learning yourself as anything else. She has made tremendous strides in learning better ways to react, vent, discuss and so on.


I think by being INFP, you probably do understand some about froz. You are emotional. So is she. But lets be honest. No one knows everything about anyone. So, your understanding is good... great in fact, but it doesn't imply correctness to the degree of 100%.

I guess I say all this because I want to protect her. Not from you. Just from further hurt. And whereas I think some of your advice is great and dead-on... or at least something to definitely consider... I don't think everything you have to say is right on. I hope that does not come across as offensive. I am hoping it comes across as further things to ponder, and if they don't fit, then they will be discarded by you. I will never profess to be an expert on anything around here. I know my wife pretty well though.

Again, I want to say thank you for all the time you have put into talking to her. You have brought up some very good points and a large number of things to consider. It is very giving of you to participate in our recovery. She grows everyday.

Just some ideas and ponderings of a FWS... Hope to hear from you again soon. Please take care.

Froz ~ I've been kidding around on the forum about how stubborn I am. I can joke about it now. It was not something to joke about several years ago.

I fought my Al-anon sponsor ~ a woman that I had sought out and asked specifically for her help ~ every step of the way. She had recovery, in a way that I envied. I wanted what she had. So I asked her to help me get what she had.

And then the wars began.

I accused her of not listening. I would tell her something that I believed about myself and she would have the NERVE to disagree with me.

I assumed this was because she wasn't listening to what I was saying.

I thought if I just explained to her a little better, if she just listened a little more, then she'd really get me.

Guess what?

She never "got me" as I thought she should. She saw the heaps of lies I told myself and others, and told me exactly how it was.

I protested that I was trying. I even spouted "progress not perfection" at her! (To try is to lie.)

Again, I told her that she just didn't understand me. (My protests were full of "But..., and I know...")

I told myself - well she's human, she makes mistakes too. I figured she was projecting herself onto me. She just jumps to conclusions, she isn't infallible!

When I finally began to acknowledge the truths about myself that she saw long before I did, I still fought her.

But....! What if? HOW? I know! I need to understand! I'm TRYING!

All of these protests were simply because I wanted recovery my way.

My mind was completely closed to acceptance and completely unwilling to surrender to anyone or anything else.

I wanted recovery, but I didn't want to follow the path my sponsor showed to me. I wanted to arrive at her location (happy joyous and free) by a path of my own devising.

I wanted it my way. Period.

Now, in my opinion, you are just as stubborn as I was. You are just as determined to maintain the facade of who you think you are and clasp those false truths to you in an desperate attempt at protection.

I am not your sponsor. You haven't asked me for that kind of help. Nor do I think you should. I am simply a faceless person on the internet offering her opinion. We don't have the relationship I had with my sponsor.

I'm not going to carry on a huge unwanted battle with you on these boards, especially as you don't know me, and therefore have know way of knowing what it is that I have that is worth fighting for ~ or even if you want what I have.

I am not angry or mad at you. I am not saying that I won't post to you or offer my thoughts.

I have no need to be right here.

My recovery was not out of great flashes of understanding, or my great intellect and wisdom, but from eventually being willing to surrender and accepting the wisdom of someone else. It was not an intellectual awakening, but a spiritual awakening.

My recovery was a decision to surrender my will. No trying, no understanding, nothing but simply becoming willing to give up my will.

Patriot ~


This desire to protect is a good thing, and a very bad thing.

If you attempt protect Froz from all hurt and pain, that life dishes out, you will be protecting her from the experiences she needs to learn and grow.

I can tell you that in my life, I made the mistake many times of well meaning protection, and in the end, I discovered the ugly truth. That I believed the other person was not capable of handling life experiences. That I believed I was smarter and stronger and should therefore decide what the other person should deal with.

I thought I was God.

Much of what Froz needs to hear is going to be painful. Growing is painful.

If you protect her from pain she will not grow.

I understand, that some of your protectiveness comes from horrible guilt that you must be experiencing from watching her pain.

You didn't cause all of her pain, no matter how convenient it is for both of you to blame you.

If it is all Patriot's fault, its under Patriot's control. You are already both in a power struggle...hmmm...see the connection?

Protecting her from your own faults and weakness on the other hand, is a very very loving thing to do.

BrambleRose,

I didn't view our discussions as "battles". I viewed them as exploration. You have helped me to explore many things here. They have been useful to me, and others here have stated it has been useful to them, as well.

I am so very grateful for the time you took to do that, and the manner in which you have shared yourself in doing so. I understand a "tough love" approach and I never perceived it in any manner other than a giving one.

I do see a lot of paralells and have learned much from our discussions. It's a wonderful gift to have someone take the time to give an objective perspective of yourself and your actions. I take it as such, and I will say thank you again.

There are some points you raised that I agree with, and some that I do not, respectfully. That is my right. It doesn't necessarily mean that I am in denail, simply because I disagree. You also have a right to your opinion, as does anyone on this forum. I can't control what anyone else thinks.

I do know that I am not closed-minded. I also know that I do desire intimacy with my husband. Do I fear intimacy in general? No, I do not. There is a certain element of fear involved in intimacy with Patriot, simply because he has hurt me in the past. To open myself up to intimacy with him is to be vulnerable. I am willing to be vulnerable. It's a risk I have chosen to take. It's scary, sure...but it would be an exercise in futility if I chose to remain in this marriage with a complete unwillingness to be vulnerable.

I really appreciate the fact that you let me know you weren't angry with me and that I can hope to hear from you in the future. I could be mistaken, but that tells me that you were concerned I may perceive it as a rejection. I don't, but I think it was kind of you to care whether or not I felt rejected.

I will continue to ponder some of the points you raised.

Just for the record, I didn't go whining and crying to Patriot. That's not why he "defended" me. I don't presume to know precisely what motivated him, and I wasn't emotional or upset about anything you said. As I said before, I completely understand (being familiar with Al-Anon) a tough love approach. I also understand the concept of enabling, and I don't think that's what Patriot was trying to do.

We both understand that growing is painful. We are also both aware that a lot of my pain stems from my childhood, long before I ever met Patriot. Some of it he IS responsible for. Some of it he is not.

Thank you again, truly, BrambleRose.

Our session with Dr. Harley was amazing.

We talked with him together for a few moments and answered some questions, then we each talked to him separately.

I went first.

I really liked his approach. I like that he views sessions as "Marriage Coaching", rather than counseling. So many of his views were very different from MC's we've had in the past.

Patriot and I were both glad that Dr. Harley seemed impressed with a lot of the progress we have made on our own. He said some of it just needed tweaking.

He said that I haven't healed properly. He gave the analogy of the both of us coming to him for a fitness program to get into shape. He said it would be unlikely that I would be able to participate in his fitness program if I have a large gash in my leg. He said we needed to heal that wound properly before I begin a rigorous fitness program. That made perfect sense to me, and seemed like a very logical explanation for why I seem to fall behind in Recovery sometimes. I look forward to healing that wound properly, although I know it won't be painless. I'm ready to heal. Walking around with a gash in my leg kinda sucks.

He also noted that the more creative the individual, the more the need for details of an A seems to arise. I am extremely creative. Again, his explanation made perfect sense.

Patriot spoke with Dr. Harley next. I can't share his portion of the session, because they spoke alone.

After they talked, I joined them again and we talked about a plan for action. We were given some assignments. Right now my assignment is to fill out the EN Questionnaire again, only this time, instead of listing how well Patriot is meeting those needs, I am to list things he can do in order to meet those needs...give him examples. Patriot was given the same assignment and we are to fax our questionnaires to Dr. Harley.

I don't know what Patriot's other assignments are. It was something about exploring "why's".

I felt almost elated after our session. As it turns out Patriot did, too. Odd, as the majority of the session we spent talking to Dr. Harley separately. I think it just felt GREAT to have a plan. It also felt great that he thought we were on the right track. Dr. Harley made it seem not only possible that we would recover, he made it seem quite likely.

It was worth every penny to me.

That is awesome froz - I am so happy you guys called him!

(((HUGS)))

I have to agree. Dr. Harley is quite good coaching on the phone.

The greatest thing about the call was that we were talking to an MC that knew the MB principles. For as obvious a statement that may be, I believe where we have fallen short with MCs locally is they have not been MB experts, and thus, have not met our expectations completely.

He did state all we needed was some tweaking and that what we had been doing up to now was not futile in the least bit.

He asked a number of questions that I think were to find out where I was at on the ideals that he follows and were I was having difficulty. Ha also gave me the 'wounded leg' analogy, which made perfect sense. In discussing with me, he did talk about what I needed to do to assist Froz healing the wound. My assignment has 3 parts. Why, which is the discussion of how I was able to have an A. Granting that I made the decision to do it, and therefore am totally responsible for it, he did talk some about ENs and hwo they play into things. The next is validate. Which, simply put, is get froz to buy it. Understand it. Last was a plan. That will be something she and I will have to discuss. But she is a plan kinda girl.

I did feel very good about the session. Dr Harley and I did talk about the fact that forz and I were a little different than most folks in that she and I were coming to him after trying recovery for a while and come to find out, being fairly successful. Anyway, I have the EN assignment as well, which I have done. I told froz my top 5 from that yesterday, because it moved around a little bit since the last time we did these.

Also, we looked into the INFP and INTP and so on stuff. It seems I am ENTJ(extroverted intuitive thinking judging) and when Froz read through some of it, it sure seemed to fit me.

On a down note, I feel bad because yesterday I was pretty busy when I got home, or I was playing a game on the computer and she was on the phone... and then time ran away and it was bedtime. She wanted to discuss the INTP and all that stuff and I was just tired and wanted to go to sleep. At first I was listening but I wanted her to hurry up and come to bed. She didn't and after a while I asked if we could discuss it tomorrow. She said that she hadn't gotten any time with me(implying that she was getting her time now) I was irritated because I wanted to go to bed. From there it just didn't go well in my mind, although we didn't have it out or anything. I just felt bad because I was tired and would rather go to sleep that stay up and discuss the stuff with her. Anyway, I felt bad and said I was sorry. She said there was no need. But, it is these kinds of instances that start us on the downhill slope of her not feeling close to me and so on. It is great to have good reccovery times and to feel close to her. But, they don't seem to last long as I wish they would.

I can't babble on this any more.

I love this word .... especially in this context.

Carry on you two <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

Pitbull Rose said:


Mine too. I remember exactly where I was .... on the floor of my closet with the doors closed. In the dark .... on my knees, surrounded by my shoes. I was totally utterly lost having been my own ego-god.

I'm a very smart woman. I have published in medical journals. I could not make this recovery work using my intelligence. All my usual 'tools' had failed me. I was circling the drain, going down ... dragged down by my own fighting for control .... I surrendered to God's will that day. And I re-surrender daily (sometimes several times a day) with the serenity prayer.

I visualize myself in His arms, like a child. Sometimes this puts me back into perspective.