This put a smile on my face. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

Bird,

Sounds like recovery to me.

You will find that time seems compressed somehow. 2 Weeks can seem like months.

Remember, they say it takes at least 2 years to recover from this. And that's with a NORMAL affair - whatever that is. Your case may take longer.

All the best.

bigkahuna -


Ack! I was really hoping (still am) for a shorter duration (see my remarks about lack of patience above). I do hope that during the recovery process things get better the farther down the road we go.

I hate to think of spending the next 2+ years kicking myself for what I did wrong, trying to cover my hurt and pain because my wife is not yet at a spot where she is able to or wants to care, wondering how long it will be before I have her love all the time, etc.

I do believe that a path to successful recovery will snowball (i.e., we will build upon prior successes as we go along).

I've just about finished SAA, and am wondering when we can start working on the Four Rules To Guide Marital Recovery (Protection, Care, Time and Honesty). And how to bring this up with my lovely wife. I'd like to start now, to be honest <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I haven't read Managing Resentment and Restoring Trust and Renewing Marital Commitment yet. I know that Managing Resentment and Restoring Trust are going to be critical for both myself and MP. She is (understandably) angry, hurt and bitter that it took this A to fully wake me up to the problems in our marriage, when she'd been bringing them to my attention for some time now.

My LBs (selfish demands, disrespectful judgements, and angry outbursts - I swear when I went through those three chapters in Love Busters Dr. Harley was writing them specifically for me) have destroyed her ability to trust in me enough to open herself up and make her vulnerable.

Of course, I have my own resentment and trust issues to work through.

What a mess. Not the best way to start of a new year, but on the other hand at least we're starting it off determined to restore and rebuild our marriage.

If we're in recovery, does that mean I should move from GQII over to Recovery? Just kind of curious as to what the accepted protocol, if any, is.

BB, with all due respect to Bigkahuna, you might be on the very edges of starting recovery.

I would say 2 years is a pretty good appraisal. It's interesting that that's the time usually given for people who are grieving. When my mother was grieving for my father (who died), 18 months was probably the worst time of all and then she began the REAL recovery.

We're over 2 years now and I would say it's taken the full 2 years. We don't talk about it any more but I know it'll always be there.

You sound so like Bob Pure when I told him 2 years. He said "not on your nellie" or other English expressions to that effect. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I started on the Recovery board and then moved here. I've always felt comfortable here. The Recovery board has it's own vibe - not a bad vibe - just it's own vibe.

Also, just out of interest, did Magpie read any of the thread that's been causing a fair bit of trouble on here.

I actually thought it should be required reading for WS's. The comments about "this is rare and this is different" are almost laughable they're said so often by WS's. It made me cringe and brought back quite a few of the dreadful things I said and did during my "foggy" phase.

I know it was troll-like but, unfortunately, it was very typical of how WS's are thinking in the depths of the fog. I must add I was NOT as vindictive as that. But I guess that's relative.

Jen -


I would agree with your assertion, given that MP's only been home 2 weeks, and admission of the affair is only 2 months old or so.



So it sounds like the next 2 years are going to be pretty bad? Does it get better during the 2 years, or does it take 2 years of hashing things out before recovery begins?

Sorry if I'm being impatient or asking dumb questions. I'm just trying to prepare myself as much as I can for what the next period of time will entail (not that you can ever be fully prepared).

It takes 2 years of hashing things out unfortunately.

6 months after you've just found out are notoriously bad. And they were for us. We decided to separate in the June which would have been around the 9 month period. That lasted a day but was a particularly bad time.

There was the other time when, out of the blue, my H went through my phone records and rang me at work wanting to know what the "odd" numbers were. I told him to call the number and it was just me checking my voicemail - as I had known it would be.

I bumped into the OM one day last year and talked to him for about half an hour (VERY well documented on the board) but I told my H the minute he got home. It was still a bad time.

Triggers for my H from movies, triggers from seeing a car like his (he has a vanity plate and I KNOW my H still looks for it).

It goes on for ages. Sometimes it peaks, sometimes it's not there at all.

I'm sure if one of us brought it up we WOULD talk about it, but there's no need any more.

Jen -


I'm not sure which thread you're referring to. Is it the Magpie thread you started, or Dorry's FWW thread? I've pointed her to both of them, but do not know if she's read them (with her new job and our daughter being sick we've been doing a lot of split-shift parenting and/or one of us staying home - I can read and post from my job, but she can't).

Jen -


Ack! Again. In some ways it already feels like its been 2 years. I have to say that I'm really not liking this emotional roller coaster...of course, who would?

Well, I'd rather know up front than have people tell me things will get better quickly (though I was becoming so fond of my snowball analogy <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> ) and then have them take forever to improve.

My wife keeps telling me to take it day by day, and I try...but sometimes it's more like hour by hour or minute by minute.

I do have to admit, there are days when things are good, and I do see positive signs along the way. I'm just greedy and impatient....

I meant any thread by Ashley15.

Yes, hour by hour, minute by minute.

Gotta go, BB. My H and I own a bookstore and he has just brought home about 30 gardening and interior design books which I get to look at before they get put in the store.

ooooooooh, bliss.

BB,

Look, recovery is a process. As I said, recovery ***STARTS*** when both partners commit to the marriage and start working on it.

The ***PROCESS*** of recovery, they say, can take 2 years. I would add, especially in your case with your issues.

I agree with your snowball analogy too actually. It does get better and snowballs. But I still have dark days and so does my wife. There are well documented stages of recovery such as around the 3 month mark, a WS will start really wondering how the ****** they could do what they did. Around 6-8 months a BS may start to get really angry about what happened.

Nut you just keep your eye on the ball and KNOW that if you stick with it you WILL get through it.

I discovered my wife's affair in September last year. In my si, I ask if it's too early to say recovered. I sure feel recovered but I know there will probably still be some peaks and troughs I have yet to travel and knowing that I am looking at 2 years will help me to get through them.

Don't fool yourself bird. It's good that you are feeling better but Magpie seems to still be in the doldrums a bit. Your situation is about as bad as I have seen. You can't possibly be recovered in 2 weeks. Figure at least 2 years or even longer. Thank God every day for what he is doing. Enjoy the good days, get through the bad. Don't set yourself up for disappointment by thinking you have arrived.

Recovery is a marathon on a rollercoaster, not a sprint on a sliperydip.

BB, KiwiJ is absolutely right. When I killed squid's affair and she stated to show me commitment I was in cuckoo land ! Recovered ! easy Peasy ! But such was gratitude and relief talking.

Jen learned this wisdom regarding recovery times the hard way - as did I.

Its been 18 months since d-day, just over a year into recovery for Squid and I, and its as hard for me as any time since d-day right now.

recovery used to be referred to as a 'rollercoaster' on these boards, which was VERY accurate. Wild, joyful hghs, desperate lows. The speed we take teh curves slows over time.

I have come to realise that we spent much of the last year "hanging on" not actively recovering ( as Squids Mom was expected to die any day for ALL that year). This makes me sigh as I know some bady healed wounds need to be reopened soon for us to continue recovery.

Its not just the duration that effects recovery but how you spend the time, too.

All blessings

Jen, bigkahuna and bobpure -

Thanks for answering my (probably frantic sounding) questions. I always knew that we were in for a hard long road, but I can't help but hope it'll be shorter.

For now, I'll keep doing what I've been doing, and try to focus on the positives that I see.

Thanks again for all your honest answeres, and your encouragement.

A slightly new question.

Once NC is established, what do you do if the OM continues to try to contact your wife?

My wife agreed to NC upon her return, and understands its importance to me and us. It's been off to a shaky start, but she has been honest with me when I ask her about contact.

During our MC session today, I asked her to delete all the OM's contact information from Outlook and her cell phone. She did this while I was getting us lunch on the way home.

We had just pulled up at home when her cell phone rang. She didn't recognize the number at a glance (confused the area code with her cousin, which I have done as well), and answered it. Guess who?

Yep...the OM. Their last contact was early last week - she called him to answer some questions he had asked her. I was not happy about that, but I thanked her for her honesty and restated my stand on NC.

I am not overly concerned about her part of the NC deal, as I believe she will adhere to it (or tell me if it gets broken, so we can re-evaluate the measures in place). I am concerned about his attempts to contact her. She told me after revealing the last contact that she did not think he would be contacting her again because he was very mad at her.

I politely told her that I had heard that song and dance before from him in early December 05, when he supposedly broke of contact....and then called her 3 days later because "he couldn't stay away".

He had intended to leave her a voice mail (thinking she would be at work), so they didn't talk very long (less than a minute).

So...what do I do about the OM? Within reason, of course.

BB, the OM contacted me by e-mail 6 months after the A to wish me Merry Christmas. I must admit I DID reply (one line and this was before MB) and I told my H immediately.

There was always going to be a chance of the OM contacting me so finally my H exposed the A to his wife. When he spoke to her he said "your H is very lucky that I haven't turned up on your doorstep to give him a punch in the nose."

Needless to say I never heard from him again.

Bird,

All you can do is ask her to hand you the phone if he calls or just just hang up on him. Other option is to swap cell phones - you take hers, she takes yours. And make sure your wife doesn't answer any calls from someone she doesn't know on your home phone. Using voice mail on the cell to screen calls can work too. Even change your home and cell numbers.

It's not too hard - assuming your wife is 100% on NC it should be easily defeated by these suggestions.

Hi Jen -


Unfortunately, in this case, there is no wife to expose to (they're getting divorced). There are others I could potentially expose the affair to, but I'm not sure what good that would do, and at this point in time I think I would only be doing it out of vindicativeness, which is probably not the best reason (clear head and all that stuff).

bigkahuna -

The advice you give is good, and are things I have thought about.

I was able to talk with my wife briefly after work before I took our DS to Scouts. I let her know (without LBing) that I was very angry, but not at her. I was very angry at the OM for contacting her. I was also scared/worried, because of the threat he poses, and the setbacks contact can cause.

We were able to talk last night during our devotion time. We spent almost 2-1/2 hours talking about various things, in addition to the scripture we read. We both came away feeling that it was time well spent, as we were able to get some things out in the open between us.

We worked up a plan for NC...well, it was mostly (if not wholly) my plan, but she did agree to it. She understands how I feel about contact with the OM, and why I feel that way.

We are going to draft a NC letter (should this be e-mail or a regular snail mail letter - maybe certified?) and send it to him.

She will continue to work on her end of NC, which she has been doing and I have thanked her for. If she slips up and contacts him, she'll let me know. I have promised her that I will not get angry or yell, or do any LBing, though I may be hurt and dissapointed.

She will not accept contact attempts from him, and will let me know if he does try to contact her.

If the OM continues to try to contact her, especially after receipt of the NC letter, I will then contact him and have a little talk with him (no, I'm not going to get violent or threaten him). If he still does not stop attempting to contact her, I will then investigate legal measures, since I will view it as harassment (not sure how the US Judicial system would view it, especially since we're not even in the same state).

Switching phones, changing numbers, etc are all valid options that MP and I will explore if NC cannot be maintained.

As I said, right now I'm more concerned about the OM trying to make contact than my wife. She told me last night that she is trying very hard (and succeeding, from what I can tell) to not even think about him, because if she does she will be tempted to contact him. She told him this also.

I do not bear any ill will towards the OM (well, at least not most of the time. I do have my moments <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> ). He was at one time a friend of mine. I have forgiven him for his actions, but our friendship cannot be restored on this earth. He is too much of a threat to our marriage. And I do grieve for the loss of the friendship.

One of the things that came out of last night's discussions was the topic of forgiveness. Not forgiving others, but our individual ability to forgive ourselves for what we have done that is wrong.

Last night, my wife told me (in a loving way) that I had acknowledged, repented, asked forgiveness for and taken ownership of my issues that contributed to the state of our marriage, and that I needed to stop flagellating(?) myself for them and focus on moving forward in our recovery. She has a valid point, and I realize the importance of this - I cannot move forward if I continue to focus on the past, and by focusing on the past I run the risk of slipping into a self-pity party. All rather counter-productive to recovering, restoring and rebuilding our marriage.

So here is where I hope some former BS's (and/or former WS's) can help. How do I forgive myself for what I did?

Most of what I did wrong I can forgive myself for. But I am having an incredibly hard time forgiving myself for my sexual sin (voyeurism). I now realize how absolutely devestating this was to my wife, how it degraded her, made her feel devalued, unloved. I see the pain in her eyes.

In many ways, this tears me apart more than the A. I do not know if I can adequately describe the pain, hurt, self-loathing, guilt, self-hatred and anger I feel with/at myself for this. I know God has forgiven me, and I believe that my wife will at some point during recovery forgive me, but how do I forgive myself?

I just can't simply say that was the old me and now I'm a new me, a new creation in God, and leave it at that. I don't see how it could be that simple. It can't be that simple. Nothing that has happened in my life, or that I have done in my life, not even the death of my dad, hurts anywhere near as bad as this does.

I know that what I did does not justify my wife's affair, and I'm not trying to. But it was a huge factor in the state of our marriage, and it was so utterly wrong and distasteful, and I knew it was but wouldn't let it go. I know that I need to forgive myself for us to move on to recovery, but I really am at a complete loss as to how to do that.

My wife has similar feelings about some of the things in her life (current and past). Any advice would be truly appreciated.

The Bible talks a lot about forgiveness - our forgiveness from God, and forgiving others. Does it talk about forgiving ourselves? (Yes, I am that ignorant in the Scriptures, though I'm rapidly acquiring knowledge).