Ahhh...Young Adult Sons... <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />

This is MY LINGERING ISSUE..

As Lemon says here:



This was recently told to me by many posters on a thread I entitled "MY LINGERING ISSUE"...So True, Lemonman...

Leslie, I am certainly guilty of enabling our sons. This was a MAJOR ISSUE in our marriage which I had to address during PLAN A. My H felt left out of the decision-making. In our case, I WAS THE CONFLICT-AVOIDER..not anymore..I wanted everyone to be HAPPY...well, I wanted my sons to be "Happy"..My H wanted to teach them how to be MEN and I was WRONG (no other word for it) according to Steve Harley in continuing to be a CONFLICT AVOIDER and in continuing to ENABLE them...

So Steve told me to turn over the decision-making regarding them to my H because he was RIGHT and knew how to manage them...

Does this fit at all with your situation?

He didn't recommend POJA on this..said my H knew more about how to be a MAN...

I'm not sure why..come to think of it...that there was no mention of POJA in our situation...

Maybe too early in Recovery?

BTW, now my H and our OS are closer than they have ever been..since I have gotten out of their way....

I have two sons, too - 21 and 24. Now days it seems to take them a little longer to leave the nest. But I didn't make it easy for them to sit around and expect me to take care of things, and they didn't get money from me.

We had a rocky time for awhile, but now they are both self-supporting, and thankfully have no children yet. Along the way, at times, I felt like I cared more about their business than they did.

I have no advice to give to you in regards to the marriage as I am in the process of MB ing with my husband. I just want to give you support anyways. I read all of your posts and I have to say the people that are giving you help are very good at this. I will continue to read on and hope that your story will have a very happy ending. Always remember the power of prayer and what God can do for you and for your husband.

I am concerned for the drug addicted son. I hope he can recognize that he has a serious drug problem and needs help. My oldest son was addicted to cocaine and it nearly ruined his life. Its been a year now since he has been clean from this. I am very proud of him and his life is so much better now. He looks back and remembers those awful times, He can see clearly now how it was ruining the quality of his life. He is so much happier now, he holds down a job now, he works out, has nice friends and is a responsible young man.

I hope your family will have brighter roads ahead. It sounds like you really have had your share of heart ship. I know it's hard not to reach out to your kids. I understand why you do, and I think only a mother can really appreciate this.

In my prayers

SunKissedBeach

In my state, if your son went to the Social Services Agency and indicated that he needed assistance in setting up a household, he would get all kinds of assistance. He would need to go to Social Services and obtain a Caseworker. He would get assistance for daycare, medical care and housing. Couldn't he qualify for low rent housing or some sort of subsidized housing? If your son is at all like mine, he wants you to look into all of these things. I did so much for our YS that almost he seems unable to do such things without my assistance. I continue to help him but I am pulling him away. Maybe you can look into this, direct him and then pull back..helping him work towards gaining his independence.



Not good for a Recovering couple, I think. There is a need for OPENNESS and HONESTY. You need to stand by your insistence on this by modeling this in yourself. By H seems surprised and delighted by me continuing to keep my promise to tell him everything..just as I expect this of him..TRANSPARENCY. I used to keep all kinds of secrets about the children and finances.

Sun,

You and I are both concerned about my son. I had to come to terms a long time ago that the decisons my son makes are his and his alone. I can not force him to change no matter how much I want him to.

I have a hard time with the useage of any drugs (son's drug of choice is marijuana). I think this is part of the reason son and I clash so often is because he knows I will never accept that he uses any form of drugs.

My son has applied for Rental Assistance. He has even gone in to a meeting that was scheduled. I don't know if they have a huge waiting list or if my son is not considered a priority since he has a roof over his head. This is what I am trying to get my son to find out.

Social Services, he has gone there and they wanted a list of the bills he is paying. He supplied that and basically since his car is paid for and all he really pays that he can prove is pre-school and car insurance he is not considered destitue enough for assistance. It doesn't matter that he can't even afford health insurance for himself.

Basically what I do with helping my son is let him know that he needs to go to point A and apply for whatever the case maybe. Then I leave the rest up to him. A few days later I follow up with him to make sure it was done.

As far as the seperate banking issues, I at some point want to establish a joint account, I just don't think we are there yet. Part of the reason is until I see that H is commited to us, I can't give up my safety net. In one of our upcoming MC sessions I do intend to bring up the idea of us doing a budge together and joining funds. I just am not there yet.

This is about where I am with our YS. To me, it's frustrating to even have to do this for him... <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />


Think about whether you are being hypocritical. Would you want him to be saying this? If I were you, I would want to at have access to ALL of his money. What if he does not want to become committed to a wife who is not totally transparent and honest with him? That is how I felt about my H when we reconciled. I needed for him to be totally open and I did the same. See my thinking?

Did you have a post that you deleted? Seems like I read that you said that your life would be easier(?) without your H. I was wondering if has gotten the message that you feel this way.

The reason that I say this is that a major lure of the OW in my situation was my H's FEELING that she REALLY LOVED him and I did not. She tried to convince him of this..that she was the one who REALLY loved him.(I even heard her say this when she was begging him to come back to her in the end.) For many years, my H felt disregarded/neglected by me. He felt that I considered him a hindrance to me getting things done, that I felt I was always in the right (self-righteous) and that I did not want his input into decisions regarding the children. So he was starting all over again with the OW. She ADMIRED him, looked up to him, NEEDED him, LISTENED to him, got his ADVICE on how to rear her daughter... In Plan B, he learned that this was ALL SHOW, he calls it BS now. She couldn't keep this up 24/7. However, my Plan A, evidencing my love and ADMIRATION of him, was a BIGGY....

Plus, the OW in my case GAVE HIM FIRST PRIORITY IN HER LIFE OVER EVERYONE AND EVERYTHING ELSE...

I got the reminder from Steve Harley that this is what a wife is SUPPOSED to do..FORSAKING ALL OTHERS..and that includes our children...put your husband/wife FIRST and then the TWO of you as a TEAM are to PARENT TOGETHER...

It might be a change that your H is making in middle age. My H definitely had a crisis and now is much more emotional, affectionate and willing to be vulnerable. I think it's because he's already done all the professional, breadwinning stuff and now is more focused on relationship. You might be surprised at what is going on inside of your H now.

Just throwing this stuff out to you to see if any of this fits in your situation since like us you have challenging/demanding young adult children that take up your time and he had an affair with a much younger woman.

Keep your separate finances until you feel comfortable reconnecting them, Leslie. There's no hurry. Your husband has not yet totally recommitted to the marriage and hasn't yet given up his secrete savings account. These are things that are available for POJA when the time comes.

Longhorn:

Do you not see Leslie as being IN RECOVERY?

Her H seems no different than other WSes in the beginning of Recovery....

I wouldn't have even gone into Recovery unless my FWH agreed to reveal all of his bank accounts to me. The first week he either closed them or added my name...the same with my account.

I'm not understanding your recommendation to Leslie.

IMO, it's either Recovery or not...keeping separate accounts is PLAN B...

One of the 4 Rules of Marital Recovery:

Mimi, I think you're just as good a person as you can be, but timing is the key here. I've read those rules repeatedly and they are written in SAA in the context of a well-advanced stage of recovery, not when the wayward spouse is barely a week and a half into withdrawal. Patience is an absolute necessity in this. Nothing in this has to be done overnight, okay?

Threadjack over.

Longhorn...I think you're GOOD PEOPLE, too... <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

We're basically on the same page...

BUT I was counseled to do Extraordinary Precautions and Rules of Recovery RIGHT AWAY...part of my negotiations BEFORE FWH even came home....

I am so into this because I think our going following these guidelines this last time prevented ANOTHER FALSE RECOVERY...We went through two and a half(he ALMOST left again) of those...YUK....

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

Thank you for saying that LH. I have to admit I felt like s*** when mimi said what she did, because I am not to the point that I trust H enough to combine our finances. We have yet to have an honest conversation. Right now H is still all about H and I can't give up my "safety net"

As much as I am trying, and am willing to go transparent, it will take both of us to do this.

I am hoping to bring up issues every week in MC. I do not want to toss everything out at once because I think it would be more than h could handle.

As of yet, he has yet to show remorse, has not mentioned the savings account that has the money in it, nor has he brought up anything of significant importance.

I know it will take time on his part but at some point somewhere down the line his actions must show he is committed to our marriage.

Heck why would I even consider puting my money in one account with his when he has yet to even "kiss" me.

Sorry rambling again

MiMi,

My H is a conflict avoider. He is not to the point where I can sit down and talk to him about anything. Right now I'm not even convinced that he is still not talking to the OW. Not only is H taking baby steps but I am also having to take things slowly.

Even today H has not removed password from cell phone account (although he says he lost his phone, which I don't think is lost, I think our son took it) H has not removed password to computer, nor has he shared his email information with me. So I don't think one can blame me for being cautious.

We have so many years of a marriage that is now dead. What I have to make sure of is that H understands that I am not willing to go back to what we had.

Every week I will have to decide in my mind what the most relevant thing is that I need to address in MC. This week while I have so many things I want to bring up (son, finances, banking, OW, passwords, etc) the most relevant one will be my helping out our son.

If I go to fast H will run the other way. Now don't get me wrong I would love to be able to lay it all out on the table at one time but I know this can't be done.

H can access my computers, IM's and email. The only thing he does not have access to is my bank account. There is only approx $1,500 in there which is barely enough to cover anything if h were to leave again. My thoughts are it's better to be safe then sorry. If this sounds like I am preplanning filing papers then I'm sorry, that is not my intent.

If I wouldn't have had a little in the bank when he left, I would have been up s***s creek.

Leslie:

I surely don't want to make you feel like sh...t. You certainly don't need that at this point.

My goal has been to help you with Recovery..to help you from going through the false recoveries that I did...

I have some more feedback that you MAY NOT want to hear...

Do you want me to continue or not?

Remember as a REFORMED CONFLICT AVOIDER, I fully understand about avoiding conflict...

Leslie, you have to work through this the best way you can. You know your husband and your situation best...and you've gotten an education in Dr. Harley's techniques over the past few weeks. Follow your instincts as you feel your way through this. If they tell you to go slow in some matters, go slow. Those instincts have been right up to now. Trust them.

MiMi,

Yes I want you to continue. While some of what you say does in fact bother me I don't always think that's a bad thing. If nothing else it causes me to go back and look and think about things.

I know there are situtations and things that are unique to each situation and there are numerous things that are similar. As a "conflict avoider" yourself you probably understand more of what goes on in H's mind then I do at times. I'm more of one of those that see a problem and immediately want to talk about it, work through it and be done with it.

Hence that is my problem, I know we have numerous problems in our marriage and I just want to lay them all on the table and deal with them one at a time but I know H can't do that. I'm trying to step back and not make decisons and bring up the most pressing ones in counseling so that it may make it easier for H to talk through the problems and who knows maybe even troubleshoot solutions with me.

I know one of the things I still need from H that will need to be addressed in the near future is transparency. Don't laugh please I know this probably sounds like I expect something from H that I am not willing to do myself. This is not true. I am more than willing to do the transparence and have shown that by letting him know he has access to my computer, my email and my IM's.

One of the things that I want us to be able to do at the same time we eventually combine our bank accounts is to set up a budget together. This of course will take both of us to be in complete agreement.

For me it revolves around security. I'm not secure enough with H that our marriage will make it or that H even wants it to. This will take time and work on both of our parts.

As you can probably tell by some of my postings, at times my fuse runs low and I get to feeling frustrated and discourage and yet I will continue to hang on. Once the family commitments around here lesson I'm sure I will handle things better. Rest assurred though I am trying. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

It is good to hear from many different people. Then you can pick what works best for you.

In my case, I trusted WH with our money and he blew over $200,000. on the OW, and has NOTHING to show for it.

I think I would mention to son that he needs to get busy securing his financial future, especially by filing for child support from the child's mother.

Also I see a small problem. You are asking WH to contribute to son, and meanwhile you didn't keep your commitment to contribute to the mortgage.

Son will be going to court the end of this month and will hopefully get full custody of his son. If the judge doesn't address child support at least son will have the supporting documents he needs to start the child support hearing.


You are absolutely right here. I have apologized to H about my not sticking to our original plan on what I was suppose to pay towards the marriage. What I will do is ask H if he would prefer that I pay that amount towards the utility bills, or the mortgage of if he would just prefer that I write him a check for it. Every month I was actually paying far more then what was agreed on but no matter how much I paid I still altered our agreement without his approving the change. However I do need to sit down with him and see how he would like it handled from here on out. (I am glad you mentioned this because while I have been contributing I never asked H how he would prefer me to pay).

I do have to add though that I had made the decision to not pay the agreed on amount, I had started paying off bills to get us out of debt. (Last year I paid off close to 13k in bills). However I am guilty of not asking H his opinion just basically stopped paying towards the mortgage and took on the bills myself. This was my error and one that I need to work on. I had assumed that if H was not in agreement with my paying off the bills he should / would or could have said something, however I see now that he didn't instead he just stored the information in his brain that I was not doing what I had agreed to.

So promise to self and H from now on. I will do as I say. I will not alter from the agreed on plan unless we both agree to it. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

You are starting to get it. You can teach him about POJA by your actions. I would mention to him that you are sorry you didn't honor the agreement, and how would he like you to make amends.