Post deleted by bitter2sweet

I would continue working with your therapist. You are free to tell him that you are going to work the MB plan as far as the infidelity. There are many, many therapists, and even marriage counselors who aren't that good when infidelity is involved.

HOPEFULLY, your husband will unload the OW. That will take care of that.

B2S,

I am probably too close to you to do you any benefit. I believe you know that I'm not attacking you. Please consider my urging you to change the way you write and speak with love and support.

You are responding with sarcasm and assumptions, a defensive posturing that is detrimental to your well being and your communication with others.

I believe you are writing this way because you want to convey your frustration and do not believe that simply saying, "I feel frustrated" is adequate. I do understand your confusion why Star says you need to get help when you are doing that. The only way to understand it, not be defensive or assumptive, is to ask. What specific professional help do you think I need?

Notice your automatic judgments. "It wasn't a very productive session." Would "I didn't feel it was a productive session. I had expected ___" is closer to your truth? All this is not nitpicking on B2S...my effort is to direct your attention relentlessly to the previous invisible. These are destructive to being honest with yourself and others. And they were invisible to me. As automatic as breathing.

This is abusive: "Don't tell me I'm explaining anything away," You are saying to someone else what they cannot do. "I fear you'll say I'm explaining something away again." That's valid. That's the truth you're stating. "I don't like it when you say I'm explaining everything away. I feel attacked and insulted." "I don't understand ownership yet. I'm working on it." "I'm doing the best I can with what I comprehend right now." These are truths. They say what you are aware of and what your intent is.

You've mentioned feeling powerless to change things...situations. I am attempting to show you your own power. It may look too foreign to understand right now. Will you trust me?

I feel like you might think I'm overlooking your pain from your H's betrayal. I felt I wasn't allowed to feel it because I deserved it. Do you feel that way? Your agony is heard--it echoes throughout these boards. It's valid. It hurts. What I'm concentrating on is not the affair, which had nothing to do with you, but on you. Just you. You've had your self long before marriage, and these patterns of permission, expression and behaviors are where I'm trying to begin to help. There's too much to take at once. I picked communication and honesty first. It's where I started.

When Star asked you about reading here for years and about your marriage, you might have felt attacked. I believe she was meaning all the literature on LoveBusters and Plan A, where you see your own needs and how you can meet them yourself, protect those you love from your behaviors and change yourself. I heard you say that you couldn't get H to cooperate so it was a no go. This whole site says one spouse can save a marriage. It's possible.

Where you are in your head, entrenched in this extreme defensiveness that may not even look defensive to you at all, is actually contributing to you feeling attacked instead of supported. Each poster here is sincere to you, they are trying to help. Some of that help will hurt. That's about you, not them. I remember how very difficult it was for me to get that; pain clouds me. Please choose to trust us, blindfolded, to lead you around the room, until the pain settles a bit and you do what we are advising. Just until you can see clearly and not automatically.

LA

P.S. I lost the post I first wrote...if anybody finds it laying around, please tell me where!

Warning: Big time venting here...

Well, I was unable to get to sleep tonight. H took off this morning and I had no idea where he went. He called me back after I tried his cell phone and told me that he was taking the weekend to go somewhere alone to think things over, but I told him this was a bad time to do that because the girls would want to be with him to ring in the new year. Well, that didn't seem to matter much to him. He left me this note:



What neither of us mentioned here on Friday was that when I got up in the morning, I noticed that all his toiletries were gone out of the bathroom. I panicked and called him on his cell phone. When I reached him, he said he was at the office online. I asked him what was going on and he said that he needed some time to think, and asked me for the phone number of some friends of ours that he could talk to about this. I asked what I was supposed to tell the girls, that he couldn't just take off without warning them, and would he please come home first and call our friends from here. I also told him that I would appreciate him being up front about doing stuff like that and to please tell me rather than me trying to track him down without even having left me so much as a note. After a little while, he did come home, and then we started our computer relay posting on here all day. We actually had what I thought were some good respectful conversations and I thought we were making progress. He also said he talked to our friend for a few minutes, but that the friend was going to have to call him back later because the family was at a skating rink. As far as I know, he never called back. Then after his last post last night, where he responded to LA's question about the truth and he responded that he'd get back to her but he was emotionally exhausted, he told me that he still probably needed to get away for a couple of days to do some more thinking. I then asked him again that if he were to do that, would he please be up front with me and tell me. So this morning I get up and come downstairs to the above note.

I have to admit that I panicked again and called him until he called me back. He said that everything was okay, but he was probably going to the mountains to hang out and think, and that he would find a place to stay because there's plenty of motels around there. I wasn't too thrilled about that and asked him again to consider going to our friends' farm where he could do the same thing and have the choice of talking with them or not about things. He said he'd consider it.

(I also asked him what he meant about all the yelling, because I thought I'd been pretty calm the last couple of days, and he said that it's just that the girls make too much noise. And I wondered about the mess part, because the only mess in his main living spaces are the girls' current messes, which get picked up every few hours and then replaced with the next thing they're working on, you know, life happens.)

When the girls got up, I told them that Daddy was going to be away for the weekend, and the younger one immediately said, "But I love my Daddy" and the older one said "But he's going to miss everything" referring to New Years Eve, both spoken in very wistful tones. My heart was breaking for them so I called him again and kept trying but he wasn't answering and it kept going into voice mail. So I left him a few messages letting him know the girls reaction and would he please consider coming home for them. No answer. I also did some hard thinking a little later, resulting in my calling him and leaving a message to let him know that if there was anything on his part that was keeping him from making a decision whether to stick with this marriage or not, that I'd hear him out and still love him, and if he thought that the possibility of my getting really angry and reacting badly was a hindrance, that we could talk with a counselor or somebody in a safe place. Still no answer.

I know that I probably shouldn't have been bugging him, but I just can't shake this nagging feeling about this whole weekend thing. About a month or so ago, he told me that this guy friend of his that he met at a business meeting out of state was moving and really had no one to help him out, and that he told him that he'd come help him since he was taking a week's vacation around that time. I wasn't thrilled about it and let him know. His vacation time occurred immediately after the big fight, and he kept talking about going however many miles and hours away to help this guy that I never even heard about before. It seemed really off to me and I told him so and that I was terribly uncomfortable about him going. He kept saying that he had to honor his word to this guy, but in the last minute he ended up staying home. Then a few weeks ago, he told me that this other guy he met at his meetings had some football tickets and had no one to go with him and would he come up and hang out for the weekend and go to the game with him. Again, I felt that something was off about that and told him and anyway, what do these guys think, that your family doesn't need some of your precious little time that you don't spend working? The nerve of them! So again, he didn't go. Then when he admitted to his emotional affair, I asked him about those weekend plans, and he admitted that he was planning to see her those times. I think you can understand why I'm feeling so uneasy about this weekend, especially since it's a holiday that people who are just starting out really like to be together for. And yet he wants me to understand. Why can't he understand my reservations about this?

I get the feeling things are really about blow apart here, and I'm not talking about myself but the scope of the situation. When LA asked him for the truth, he shut down and said he needed to go away. It feels like he may be trying to escape the truth. I was also on the phone with some different people from our church, and they said that they've been noticing him very obviously trying to hide something from everybody, and that it's hard not to notice that he's hiding something. And these are people who know him and love him and wouldn't judge him. I was really truly desiring that everything come into the light for us to deal with it all, but now I'm afraid for that to happen. I'm also getting a huge feeling that I've been played along with you all in a very big bad way this past week.

Sorry to hear that. Call me cynical, but usually when one spouse that is having an EA goes away to "think", they are actually wanting to spend time with the OP.

Your husband is losing some credibility with me. He claimed to be frightened of you, and afraid for your children. Now he escapes for the weekend. Not good.

But you are not going to be able to change him, only yourself.

I would spend the day not obsessing (and I know how hard that is) and enjoying family time with your kids. Maybe you can do a little more on the house.

Also you might want to read all about Plan A again.

My heart goes out to you, and also my prayers.

b2s,

While your anger issues and psychotherapy are beyond the scope of this board....the infidelity issues are not. As you might suspect, all of these things play into each other. Infidelity is never ethical or deserved, no matter how poorly you may be meeting your spouses needs....however, the less needs you meet....the more vulnerable your marriage. Your depression and withdrawal from life has resulted in not just one or two needs going unmet....but all of them. So your marriage is more vulnerable than most.

Like believer, I'm seeing all kinds of red flags associated with your H's current actions. Now more than ever, getting the help you need and demonstrating a willingness to re-enter your life and your responsibilities as a wife and mother are extremely important. The purpose of doing a Plan A is to give your husband an attractive alternative to an affair. That plan, will mesh very well with stuff you need to do anyway....getting your house in order, getting the children's education back on track, getting control of your emotions. I know you need help to do these things....but if your spouse has crossed over to the wayward side....you can expect little help from him. His needs have been neglected for a very long time and now is "taker" will be out in full force.

I did not miss the fact that he left the children with you....something that speaks loudly about whether he really has genuine concerns about their safety....or whether he's just looking for a exit strategy. Like most marital situations.....this one is complex.....and obviously, the WS syndrome is another piece of the puzzle that we will need to use.

(((((((((((((((((b2s))))))))))))))))))))))))

B2S,

I was away in the mountains. I come back see you've pulled your posts. Why?

The last post I saw was where A4A booked for the weekend. I didn't take the time to respond--headed out the door instead. Now I regret that.

Do you think that people were against you here? Did you feel insulted or rejected...that you were pointing right at the fire and nobody would look at anything but you?

I hope you'll come back and post again. I don't believe what your H did by leaving over the weekend, the deceitful plans of it, was reasonable or correct. He said he wanted to do the right thing. He obviously didn't.

His actions remain separate from yours. I was trying to lead you to your real power. I'll be here if you come back.

LA

I pulled my posts because last week I kept asking him if he wanted to read them so he could see my thoughts and hear my heart. He apparently never did though before he left for the weekend. But I only asked him because he kept reassuring me that he had dropped OW. I wouldn't have opened up that much knowing he could easily read them if I had known that he was still very much in touch with OW and on the verge of taking his EA to the next level, while lying to me about it all along. I basically retracted that invitation to him, and while I'd like to stay on here, I don't know that I can at this point.

B2S,

Thank you for the explanation. This was a very important honesty point.

When you read what Star posted, did you see about living externally? You base your actions on his--through him, you are reflected. You are your own person, separate, whole, complete. You looking at yourself, doing for yourself, is what has been missing in your life. The depression, anger, resentments, all come from these feelings and reactive thoughts from denying that very thing--you are. You exist. You are just as God made you.

See, it took the mess in my marriage to get me there, also. My H still won't read my emails (well, three a year, and that's progress). He won't read on MB. All that doesn't really matter, because I'm here for me. And that took a bit of time to get through my head. It's why Harley says not to try to educate your spouse. It's about you. That's all you have ever been able to control--just you. You have no power in or over others.

You start with baby steps to let yourself know you're finally in your own corner. You take care of yourself, for yourself--you do housework for yourself, not your spouse. You get your rest, eat what you need, stay focused on the present, and attempt to catch yourself basing your actions on the actions of anyone else.

It's like pulling in without pulling out of life. Hard to explain. When you live externally, you're buffeted by everything else. When you live more internally, define yourself through your own thoughts and actions, then the wind dies down. Clarity comes. So does freedom, self forgiveness and true responsibility.

Yes, your H is choosing his own actions, his own way, and I believe he lives as externally as you do, using you to justify it. That doesn't make it true or right. It just is what it is. Pick which way you want to live.

You lived this way through your FOO (family of origin), and before you met your H. Living externally is an old habit and feels like survival. It's not. If you don't choose to post for yourself, then concentrate your counseling on reclaiming your self, choosing your own standards and boundaries and accept who you are and your separateness.

I feel sad that you wouldn't have opened up as much as you did if you had known H was still in his A. You're at a climax in your life for growth, and more of his disclosures are coming. I want you to understand all the way to your bones, that's his choice. Not yours. You can't get there just in your mind. You've been living like you're responsible for his feelings and actions a very long time; and he, yours. This enmeshment is where a lot of your pain, that indescrible, unidentifiable pain comes from.

You can make it through this, if you make it about yourself.

LA

The thing is, I do want to post here, but I know that he still reads here too, and that's what is holding me back from posting. If he isn't desiring to be intimate with me but is choosing someone else to be intimate with, then I really don't want him to read the words I write as I work on myself, or to read the words you or others write to me and then come tell me how much I'm failing to live up to them. I have enough of the voice of failure in my own head that I'm trying to get rid of without adding his voice to it. I know you'll say that I'm living externally just by my saying this, but it's an added stress I feel I cannot handle right now.

B2S,

Am I reading you correctly? You said that you do want to post here but you are being held back against your desire because your H isn't desiring to be intimate with you but with someone else.

I hear you say that you can't post because he's unfaithful? I hear you can't do for yourself because you don't want him to tear you down for it. You're saying you fear your H's dj's and that your fear stops you from posting.

And you knew that I would say you're living externally by posting that.

Well, you got that right. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> (Big smile to indicate that you're still posting, living externally, and getting the same results.) Think I didn't know about your H's side of abuse? Thought you were crazy?

You can't be abused emotionally if you recognize it. It's when you own other people's stuff that you get battered.

Thought for the day.

'k.

Who do you want to be? What does it matter what he says, since he's an alien right now...not your H?

And why do you say it's added stress that you cannot handle right now...you've been handling his DJ's for years. What makes now so different? Every day you wake up, breathe, take care of the girls, post, cry, drive...you are handling stress. We handle it--we may not enjoy how we do it or that we have to do it at all.

Come from strength and focus, B2S...stop lying to yourself.

LA

Hmmmmm.....thinking this over for now......

LA,

Okay, I've been thinking of your last two posts among other things for the last day or so. I think I'm finally starting to get what you and others are saying about living externally. I've been doing this like forever! And I've been told over and over by others in the past couple of years that I need to be doing things for myself, not for anyone else, and I couldn't understand what they were talking about. It sounded very selfish to me, but the irony of that is that I was already pretty self-centered so what harm would it have caused to give it a try? LOL!! I'm a christian, so I've always been taught that I need to "live for Jesus". And as a wife, that I should always put H's needs before my own. So I couldn't justify living for myself. But I think your explanation really helps in my understanding of this. I haven't been responsible for myself at all. I don't know that I exactly wanted H to be responsible for me, at least not totally, but it's more like I've been waiting for something to change in me or in my life situation without taking any steps myself. Well, I have taken some small steps in the past, but I would get discouraged and then quit and go back to where I was, or to an even worse place. I think it was because I was looking for some kind of approval from H or even others, and when that didn't come, well, just forget it, it isn't worth it. But you say that's living extarnally, right? I think I may be getting it. (I think also my meds started to kick in really good this week too and there is some light coming through the darkness that I've been 'living' in for far too long.)

Actually, it may come down to fear more than anything else. I do recall that last spring I was introduced to a particular book that some women on another list found to be very helpful, as in breakthrough helpful, in doing this very thing. But as I read it, though I did find it to be potentially helpful, I didn't actually 'do' the exercises or write anything down. Now part of that is probably due to the murk my head was in, and I just couldn't get my thoughts together. But I don't think I really wanted to be accountable to myself, I wanted someone to tell me what to do and to be. I don't even know what I like anymore. H used to tell me that I needed to get a hobby, but I couldn't think of one thing that I wanted to pursue.

I remember that when we went to see the first Lord of the Rings movie a few years ago, afterwards, and more than once, I said that I wanted to go live in a hobbit-hole. I think it was because I loved the idea of the safe existence the hobbits had, or thought they had. But I guess it was only an illusion anyway, which is why Frodo had to embark on his journey. But boy, was that little village a place I longed for.

Anyway, I'll stop rambling for now, it's getting late and I need to go to bed.

"that I need to be doing things for myself, not for anyone else, and I couldn't understand what they were talking about. It sounded very selfish to me, but the irony of that is that I was already pretty self-centered so what harm would it have caused to give it a try?"

Hullo, Sistah!!! Ohmygosh...this was my exact reaction, only you got the 'what harm would it do to try' part much faster and without all the loss of integrity I did! Many kudos and bonding from me.

"but I would get discouraged and then quit and go back to where I was, or to an even worse place." How's big is your fear of failure? Mine was huge--I would set myself up to fail again and again. I still have to fight that. See, I feared failing, overachieved (or so it looked like) but then I would fail because that was my comfort zone, how I KNEW I'd end up before I started. I used to rather be right than happy. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

You are your own hobbit hole. It's not an illusion except when you think of it outside of yourself. Did you get the books yet from the library?

You can do this, Bee. (I can't think of a good way to refer to you except this one. B2 reminds me of Stars Wars.)

I'm excited for you. Have you looked up any Al-Anon meeting places yet?

Do I sound like a task-master? I don't mean to at all. Did I also mention "Facing Love Addiction" was a good book, too?

Not knowing what you want...not wanting at all but the vague things--security, safety, etc.--been there, know that. That is going to change, too. Slowly but surely. The first thing you identify as wanting is to know who you are. Once you start on that, understanding that part, then you begin the process of wanting again.

Very cool.

How are you doing on the homeschooling issue? Would you give public schools a try this semester? Not because you failed (I'm not saying that) and not because of the law, but because you could use the time for your business, your self-learning, your ownership. You could reassess this fall?

Taking care of yourself can take contradictory forms.

I'm here if you want to talk.

LA

P.S. I can say "ohmygosh!" if you can say, "like forever!" Are you hearing my valley girl upbringing?

I am thinking about you, sister.

LA

Thanks LA. I'm not posting much right now because I'm trying to just be quiet and learn, although the being quiet part is not coming so easily; I'm okay for a day or so, and then BAM, all this ugly stuff comes out -- blech! I told a friend of mine that what I really need is someone to stand next to me and tell me to "shut up and pray" whenever I'm tempted to say (or do) stuff that will only cause more damage. But I suppose that's the Holy Spirit's job.

Hey, Bit...

How do you like that one? I have a fondness for that name, from Lil' Bit. I don't mind you not posting. I am standing next to you, though. When you have a creepy feeling, it's me. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

It's your job. The Holy Spirit is there, like all of God, at your choice to access, but never control you. Easy access at that.

Are you reading here? Could you read my post to 35 Years Not Trusting Husband? Are you finding out why you want to damage, spill your emotions around, though you believe you don't want to do more damage?

If you can't get a handle on spewing, maybe on retracting, as a start? "I just said ____. I feel pain and want to hurt back. I believe that is wrong. I'm sorry."

"When I said that this marriage isn't over until I say it's over, I was lying. I wish this were the case. I feel so afraid, used and stomped on. Still, it is untrue and I don't want to lie to you or myself."

Stuff like this will help you to discern what to say, when it doesn't need to be said, and for what purpose you have the urge to say stuff.

I was a spewer (gross, huh?) for a few reasons. I told you one...that the Golden Rule can backfire when misapplied. I wanted my H to spew instead of withholding (and lying by omission). I also couldn't figure out what I was feeling or what I believed in, so I would spew and read the resulting mess like tea leaves. Very disrespectful to others I used to spew on.

Living externally--how much do you think about it? Living through others means that you will always have a form of anger inside of you, different levels at different times, because you are violating your most basic boundary (which you didn't even know you had)--that nobody can define you but you. That's your territory. I felt it was too terrifying, so I went with others' judgments and tried to get them to judge me correctly. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> There's the catch-22...you really will only define yourself, so forcing others to is like battling air. Ain't gonna get you anywhere but furious. And you were already angry with yourself for doing it to begin with!

How's counseling? What are you focusing on? Are you relying on the meds to contain yourself, change yourself?

Gosh, for me standing right next to you, I'm really uninformed.

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

LA

Saw your post about sex. Are you using protection or has A4A and you already done the visit to the STD clinic?

LA

No, but as I stated before, there's just no sex for us with protection; it just doesn't work and we've tried numerous times in the past. Am I concerned? Yes, but I have to do what I believe God wants me to do in this situation. Does that make me think that all my bases are covered? No, not necessarily, but I still have to do what is right.

Help me with understanding this...God wants you to have sex with H while he is in affair? He wants you to risk your health? I'm open to why you believe this is what God wants you to do.

Does God want you to make your H have sex with you?

I'm lost.

LA