This morning I asked my WW when she plans on leaving (again) and she told me she doesn't want to go live with her parents in the interm since they can be "mean" to her. Then she tried to make me feel bad about forcing her to go there instead of directly to her own place which would take several more months.

She said "it's always about me", which really bothers me since I didn't choose to have an affair, or breakup the family instead of trying to save the marriage. I wasn't the one who chose to have my needs met by someone else instead of discussing with my spouse.

I wanted to really lay into her but I know I would be LB'ing all over the place and then she would say I'm holding her A over her head again.

I still want to reply to her comment in a non-LB'ing way. Any suggestions?

Hey Guy....it's the fog talking, my FWW still sometimes says those exact same words.

She now out with hwe folks again....asked me to file...and still is happy, go figure.

I think sometimes they have to learn to forgive themselves....and just look for sometime else to lay the blame.

Best advice is...if you can't reply nicely...hold your tongue. Good luck.

That's "still is not happy". I'm a welder not a typist, sorry.

well, I'm not an MB expert or veteran, but here's my attempt to respond....

"It's all about our family - what's best for our family. I'm willing to do what it takes to create a happy M that meets your needs and mine, and that keeps our family together. You are not willing to do this and you keep hurting me and our family. So, the best thing for our family is for you to leave now."

FOG for sure. No doubt Hope. I am sorry about your constant pain and confusion.

I am hoping someone that is more experianced than me can give you advice on your non-LBing question.

WOL

"I still want to reply to her comment in a non-LB'ing way. Any suggestions?"

This is projection, HTW...not about you.

"Thank you for bringing to my attention that I still react, inside, to your response, rather than my own code."

No LB there...she's separate from you. If you are not holding her choices over her head (and I don't know how that looks any different than respecting her choices as hers)...then know you aren't. No hurt when you know your truth is separate and equal to hers.

I like neverthesame's words very much.

An alternative would be, "Would it help you to leave if I were meaner to you than your parents?"

Keep your own spirit, you're precious. Her choices are hers...hand them back to her.

LA

When she babbles, try babbling back:

WS said "it's always about me"

Now you know she meant you but babble back.

BS: Yes, it is all about you.

WS: I don't want to move out until my place is ready.

BS: Well that w/b convenient he? But not practical.....your WS ways are interfering with our family. You will have to leave NOW.

WS: I can't, I won't.

BS: Ok....(do not explain and do not argue - it will drive her crazy trying to figure out what u r up to). LOL!!!

Then when she is out, put her things in a bag and put them in the garage or take them to her parent's place. (use gloves) - LOL!!!

Expect her t/b furious. Something like:

WS: U touched my things. How dare you.

BS: Oh, didn't you say you were moving out? I needed the space so I helped you pack. Would you like repack them? They are (in the garage or at parent's house), just go get some boxes from a storage place or the store and you can start repacking. (don't apologize).

You may have to practice up a bit for this one.


L.

This works with my FWW when she says this to me. We have been through some rough patches where she wants me to leave or I want her to leave. We never have. But anyway.

I say.

Right now, based on our past and present, there is a you and a me not an us.

You have made that clear. At some point I made the decesion to be concerned about me more than you. I do not believe you are making a decesion right now based on me or us. Please do not ask me to.

I hope you can understand this. If you ever decide that there will be and us then I will start thinking of you before me. It will be all about you but for now without us it has to be about me.

Ok Hope, you know I'm not as nice as most folks around here.

If she insists on acting like a child, maybe you should punish her. What have you got to lose? You've put up with way more than most anyone, to what end? Everyone you care about knows you're a good guy and wouldn't blame you for letting her have it.

You deserve a good vent now and then. You can always do it in private, too. Here's a suggestion (not the most eloquent, I know):

"Yes, now it's all about me, because you've had plenty of time for everything to be all about you. So get your crap out of the home YOU chose to leave by YOUR actions or I will toss it myself. Why do you think your parents are 'mean' to you? Because you are dead wrong in every sense of the word. Everyone except your little lover and pitiful drama-loving friends knows you are wrong. So, you've alienated everyone who really loves you for some punk and you won't admit you're wrong because you're either too prideful or crazy.

I'll try to help our kids forgive you for what you've done when they're 'old enough to understand,' after they figure out that mommy couldn't handle persevering through a marriage to a decent, albeit flawed, man - even for their sake. Now get the he!! out of this family's house - you've decided you're not part of it anymore."

I think you should start packing her stuff. She is just fence sitting- that's all it is. Tell her to find someone to stay with because in _____ days she will not be staying there- unless she wants to work on the marriage.

Give her a deadline and if she's not out by that date, start packing for her!

Hope...while easier to just say "don't listen to her babble"...I want to have you revisit Orchid's note. Reverse babble...and never let her babble get to you. At this point you hang on every little thing she says because things are so bad. Bottom line is she has needed to get the frig out since Christmas time!! Now the leaves are on the trees and your torture continues. You must be unapologetic about your demand that she is gone soon. It is the fact that she demand that this process be on her terms that you must stop. I would have taken everything to her parents a month ago, changed the locks and not even let her have a toothbrush there....

Hope,

I’m still reading about your plan B in the making. If I didn’t kick you in the seat you’d think less of me I suppose.

Here it is:
2x4 on the [censored]!

Hey man, this is all about her last minute “I don’t want to get into the bed I made” mentality where she sees a world that is about to envelope her; a world that she has crafted by her own designs.

Her words, and this is my opinion, are the words of pure projection. She is lashing out at you spewing sentiments that are obviously things that she feels about herself. I believe that this is the fundament of fog babble.

So when she says “it’s always about you” she really means that its always about her, or at least certainly during the last year and she knows it. It’s her way of not looking inside at the ugly that resides there because she’s going to put it on you.

So what can you do about it?

Repeating her words exactly is one technique. Nothing made my W more angry than when I just repeated what she said like I understood. When she sees the words roll off the tip of your tongue as you mouth them she will know that they are not true, but a mirror of what she just said.

Reverse babble can work too where you turn it all around and put it back on her, but, in my experience where my W is a fighter, this just seemed to fuel the fire that I was willing to enter into an argument with her. My W, like yours, knows what the truth is and unfortunately yours is going to have to see them from the other side of the fence where the grass once looked green has turned into a field of prickly cactus on closer examination.

As SMOMW has told you over and over I believe that if there is a salvation to have happen with your M it will be after she has drank from the stagnant water of a once apparent oasis. I hate that you have to go through this and as always I offer my humble support.

Maybe this will all end with her saying she was sorry, asks for your forgiveness, and commits to NC with the OM.

Stay strong.
Plank.

Thanks to everyone for the insight and feedback. I actually repeated much of what "yearsofhurt" suggested to my WW and she basically said "whatever". So I am getting caught up in her fog babble and although I try not to let it get to me...it still does. You see she does everything else with so much rationality that I can't help but think she is being rational when she says things to me.

Orchid, that is why reverse babbling for me is difficult at times. Some of her babble sounds so rational that it catches me off guard. YOu really have to detach in order to pick up on the babble. I keep trying.

mflake, always good to hear from you my friend. Trust me, those comments are at the tip of my tongue sometimes so I just try to keep in mind that Plan B is close and finish off Plan W without any major LB'ers.

Many of you suggest she is sitting on the fence, however that would suggest she doesn't want to leave. She does want to leave and has made NO indication that she wants to stay. She just doesn't want to live with her parents in the interim.

coachswife, I have told her that I will not be spending the summer like this and she needs to leave NOW.

She has asked me for $10,000 loan so she can put a deposit on a new house and bypass living with her parents. I told her absolutely NOT.

Sendme, I am haning on everything she says and it's amplified since she doesn't say much to me anyway.

Cherished, although I feel like making AO's I am careful not to. I did tell her that it is all about me NOW.

Plank, I really don't think she is having second thoughts. If she is, she certainly is hiding it very well. All her actions suggest she wants to go and does not want to work on the M.

She has been coddling the kids very much lately so I have pulled back from the kids a little. I don't know what dynamics are driving this.

She has also asked me NOT to tell people that she wants to leave. Instead I should say it is a marital breakdown and we should keep the details between us.

I will continue to try the reverse babble.

Thanks everyone, I'm doing better really, but I need to get to Plan B soon to preserve whatever love I have left for her. If for nothing else, Plan A has effectively decreased the love I have for my WW.

This is sooo my WH...he is performing tremendously well at his job...full accountability and enjoying the challenge. With me he is Mr. CA Takenoresponsibility. Just before he left he started spinning how our marriage failure was all my fault....I worked weekends (I got off W/E work 2 yrs ago)....I got fat (and I've lost 50 lbs)...I never planned good vacations (I guess cruise to Bermuda, Disney, shore house and cross country trip don't count). I told him that I agree that I had made some mistakes and I've taken steps to correct them. But I had yet to hear him take responsibility for anything and that if he couldn't be honest with himself I didn't expect him to be honest with me.

Limbo Land is hard to deal with. The thing that finally got my WH to leave was I told him I stopped D proceedings and would not persue them until we tried different option. I was in favor of intensely working on our M for a least 3 months. He asked what the other option was. I told him he had to leave for 3 months. He chose that option.

"Marital breakdown" - I like that!

Really, just tell people the truth. Why should that bother her? I never told people every juicy detail when I was having problems, but they sure understood what was going on, and FWW had nothing to say about it.

God I wish I knew how to do the quote thing.

I forgot about the whatever thing. I am so sorry about that. That is exactly what my FWW does when I am making sense.

I should have warned you about that. I do not mean to make light but when I read that I had to laugh a little.

Rough translation of whatever. Ok what you are saying makes perfect sense. As a rational person I would have to agree with what you are saying. I would feel the same way probably. You have now backed me into a corner with logic. My response is "whatever".

My FWW uses whatever everytime that happens get used to it.

Quoting is easy...

I'll put spaces between everything so you can see what to do...

first, to start what you're quoting it's: [ quote ] No spaces in there tho.

then to end the quote: [ / quote ]

Again, no spaces.

How are you doing?