She may be totally gone - your marriage may be over.
Do we really know that yet?

That's part of the question - what will she do.

The other part of course, is what will you do.

The marriage will be saved, or it won't. You can control if YOU quit, but not if she does.

This looks really bad. You have a week before MC, that's time to talk about it with us, and to think on what you will do.

Remember who YOU are. Remember WHAT you are. There's time to adjust things.

I suggest reading the 4 rules for recovery, and the four rules for a successful marriage. Print out the part about protection and care for her to read. (do a search on the main part of the website.)

After what has happened, she ought to be going out of her way to protect your feelings. That she is not is telling.

I think I would have the talk in front of MC. Lay it out - what you expect and why (the four rules will help with that part.) Then lay out what is happening - she is meeting other men for running, and lunch. Tell the MC you think there won't be any more MC unless she really changes, and shows those changes by being transparent, and protecting your feelings.

Look at her, and tell her thanks, but no thanks. Then go to plan B.

As I said, you have a week to think, and prepare. I don't think I could, or would stay around and try with someone who activivly dated while saying they were wanting to work on M.

You know about plan B. A week gives you time to write the letter, consult with a lawyer, and separate finances.

I am not telling you what to do. If you can go longer, go longer. If you want protection now, protect your self.

Again - you can't control her, and you can't directly change her. You can try to help her, but she needs to accept the help. If she rejects the help, you need to protect YOU.

She'll become what she'll become, and you'l become what you will become. I encourage you to take the high road, and continue to treat her with love, and respect. The mark of a great person is that they don't stoop to doing low things, even when they have been wronged.

If you do lower the boom, keep your discussion about your feelings, not what she does. Remember, she chooses what she does, not you.
"I am sorry, but I can't take this any longer. You are free to do what you wish, and I don't want to control you, or make your choices for you. However, I can no longer be with you if you continue to spend time with other men, and are not willing to protect my feelings."

And so on, and so on. Don't get into a you did this, and you did that discussion.

I don't know if your sources are secret - I can't remember. If so, and you don't want to reveal them, you don't need to.
(Meaning, I don't remember if she knows you have access to her mail.)

You can be vague, and say you know she went running with another guy, and that you are through working with her until she decides she wants to work on the marriage, and proves to you that she is. (Use the rule of protection to help you with this too - it gives more info on that.)

"I'll be fine, I know I will. I wanted to love you, and grow old with you, but I can't stay with someone that won't put me, and the marriage first. Take a few days, think about it. If you want to commit to me, then do so. If you don't get back to me, that's an answer too. Here's a letter (plan B) that explains my feelings, let me know if you change your mind, and want to work on the marriage. (there are good sample letters on the forum - I'll bump the sample thread by Spacecase)

Consider your options, tell us what you are thinking -
I have to go for tonight - see you later.
Sorry - don't know the words to use to make it better. Probably aren't any - but I care.

SS

I'm not certain what's going on now. She did not go running with OM3 this morning. However, she has not said anything about him at all, and I haven't asked.

OM4, as I suspected is not a threat. She has told me about him, and he really is just someone she can talk to. She wants me to meet him and doesn't want me to feel threatened by him at all. Basically, he's the only person at her work that has figured out that OM and WW had an affair. He has no details and neither has confirmed it, but he's a sharp fellow apparently. Either way, I'm not worried about him.

OM3 is still an unknown. What do I know for certain about them? I did read an email that included all the back and forth between them. This is where WW said she wanted a running partner and they should meet on Sunday mornings and that they could meet later in the day once the weather cools off. I would think that trying to get a long-term commitment from him in that way was a bad sign. Plus the language was just plain flirty. I've never met the guy, but they are old friends who haven't seen each other at all (until a couple of weeks ago) since we married three years ago.

My sources are scarce--most of the communication is happening from her work phone and computer. Because she has been so busy with work, she has brought her computer home most nights. Usually, it's password locked but she left it out one time so I took a brief peek. This isn't a source I have regular access to at all.

But I have decided to stop checking them. I made a commitment at MC to try to trust WW. To me, that means I need to stop checking up on her. So, since MC last week, I have been avoiding looking for information. Of course, I can't unlearn what I already know, so there is still that to contend with. But I figure I can give WW a week or two weeks to prove she can not be secretive. What have I got to lose?

As many have said, I can't say anything to make her do or not do anything. So I'm not going to ... for now. I f it's seems as if nothing is progressing, I might ask if OM3 isthe reason why. Right now, if I mentioned his name, I think she would be extremely shocked. I'm hoping that she'll mention him first.

I have to entertain the possibility that after MC last week she told him they can't hang out or something along those lines. She has been trying to engage with me the last few days, not a lot, but more than in the last few months, and has been pretty forthcoming about what her plans are. All this on top of extreme pressure from work and getting a cold as well.

I've been busy entertaining DD, and that has gone very well. I'm having fun and haven't been too depressed at all. Early mornings have been very rough (not sure why?), so I take a Xanax to calm down and I can get back to sleep.

Gotta run.

Your attitude is getting better, and you are right, you can't make her do anything.

Don't be afraid to talk to her. I think you do well to not mention OM3 and to watch her, but don't be afraid to tell her your feelings from day to day, and to ask her to help you get through your own hard times. Tell her you are willing to help her through hers too - that she can come to you and talk to you.

Again, if she doesn't figure this out, and fix it, she will go from relationship to relationship and it will never end.

I hope your days are going well.

SS

I feel for you, I was trying to "trust" my wife for a few months after I noticed she had a secret email account. (this was after I caught her in an EA 6mo before). I was just working my rear off trying to meet her needs and telling myself to ignore what she might be doing online. It really didn't work for me. Things did not start to improve until I snooped and confronted her. DONT tell her how you found out your information either.

I don't think she'll change her ways until you do something. When someone thinks they are getting away with something, guilt just doesn't seem to stop them. When you catch them, then all the sudden they feel bad about it.

The ONLY thing that seems to be working is a good counsellor talking to her. Don't try to straighten her out yourself or give her MB advice, let the MB counsellors or some counsellor do it if you can. We've been in counselling for a couple of months now and things are gradually improving.

I'm still having trust issues. I've not been snooping or tracking WW, so I don't know if she's dating or building "dangerous" friendships. While she is still cautious with affection, there have been some moments where we have felt close. She has not been afraid to be close to me, and we hug and hold each other. We've talked quite a bit, although we dance around anything that might turn painful.

All this is to say that it feels like we're trying to recover but don't really know what to do next. The next MC session tomorrow will be welcome for us both I think.

I haven't had much time to write, but I'll still be updating.

Here's something for you to read.

If you think it would help your W, print it out for her.
SKM Cronicles

Trust - lets see.........
I avoided talking to you about this, and giving you this link because your MC seems to feel a little differently about trust than many of us here.
Takola on trust

If you find you are having problems with the way MC approaches it, you might want to print this trust part on a sheet of paper, hand a copy to both MC, and W, and say something like this:

"Can we discuss this trust thing? I want to trust her, but I am scared to. A friend gave me this example on trust. It explains how I have been feelings. I think there are things she can do to help me. Feelings can be changed over time, but I can't just say "Presto" and have them be different. Can we discuss things that can be done to help me regain trust?"

As usual, it would have to be in your own words, and be your own feelings, but it might help. You think on it. You don't want to tell the MC that she is doing it all wrong, but you do what to address your issues.

The things that can help are her protectig your feeings by not talking with, or setting up visits with other men. (From the 4 rules) Also becoming transparent about what she is doing - so you always know. This is not you trying to control her. My W and I are like this. If I email a women friend, I always carbon copy (blind carbon) my W. It shows her that I value her feelings and she always knows what is happening. It's not that I NEED to do it, she hasn't asked me to. It's that I value her feelings, and I want her to understand that she comes first.

Think about what she can do for you to help you. Don't be afraid to ask if you need help.


We've talked quite a bit, although we dance around anything that might turn painful.

It doesn't hurt to recognize when you hit one of these issues, and identify it out loud.

"Wow, this is one of those things neither one of us can easily talk about. I hope in time it will get easier." Then wink. (if the mood isn't too serious.)

"Dance" made me think of another thing -
One of these first nights when the kids are asleep and you are turning off the TV........... put on a favorite slow song and dance with her around the room a time or two.

Just ask her to "wait here just a minute."
Turn on the music and walk up to her.
Hold out your hand - ask "Can I have this dance."
Whisper to her "I love the way it feels to hold you when we dance." Or come other non sexual remark that expresses something you like about her.
Thank her for the dance. Tell her you love her if it feels right.

SS

We had a good, long talk last night. Neither of us were particularly interested in talking initially, but we both pushed it, and ended up talking for a couple of hours.

I don't remember everything we talked about, but the big ticket items were:

1. She doesn't feel like she can ever be attracted to me again the way she was before.
2. She's frustrated and having a hard time reintegrating into a "normal" life because I am doing everything myself.
3. The idea of a close, intimate relationship (with anyone) doesn't sound appealing to her. (She has a long-standing issue with intimacy.)
4. She apologized to me for the A and the pain she has caused me.
5. In tears, she wished that none of this had ever happened.

It was pretty intense, but it was good for us both I think. Plus, with some of the things I've read on MB this morning, I think I have some things I can work on that may help the recovery.

Someone mentioned this before, and now I see they were onto something: I need to ease off. I'm trying so hard to get things moving and doing everything around the house, that it's putting pressure on WW to feel something she may not be ready to feel just yet no matter how badly she wants to. So, I'm going to back off and try to let things happen at a more natural pace. That's really easy to say, but is going to be hard to do. What can I say? I'm impatient, and I want my wife back NOW. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Overall, doing pretty good, with a more realistic view on things than I've had in a while. I'm going to work on myself more, and stop trying to work on her so much.

I'll report on MC tomorrow.

BTW, thanks for the links! Those posts (and others I discovered through them) were very enlightening.

I hope this contiues, and forms a trend....... a good one.

It's very difficult to know all that is going on, and to help you when we only see what you write. This is not bad, just the way it is. You see her expressions, hear the tone of voice - you have all the information we don't have. Sometimes it helps (when it goes well) sometimes it hurts (when it doesn't.) You do sound better this last week.

I think you are right to slow it down.
Make sure to give your self points daily for running your plan.

Do something every day for her. In the Boy Scouts of America, they say "Do a good turn daily."

Do it for your marriage. In a way, it is a game - it's fun to score consistantly.

Nothing shows love so much as being thoughtful. Remember it won't pay off the same day, or the next day, or even the same month. Don't expect it to.
Little things, not big ones. Some small thing every day.
Make the bed
Put a new bar of soap in the shower
leave a note on the mirror (not a love note, just about something going on.)
Wash the car

If these are the things you are doing too much of, then not. Things will come to you as you look around the home and think on it.

Hope it goes well -

SS

MC was really good yesterday. It was hard, and both FWW (it's not official I guess, but it's nice to type) and I were already emotionally drained going into it.

We made progress. FWW has agreed to set some boundaries, but they are pretty far out there at this point, not where I'd like them to be, but they are in place. We talked quite a bit about trust. FWW talked about OM3 for the first time. She definitely downplayed the significance, but said that if i didn't feel comfortable with her running with him, she wouldn't have a problem with that. I didn't say yes or no, but explained why no matter how much she swears that it's totally platonic and not something for me to worry about, it's still threatening to me. I don't know anything about these guys, and all I have to go on is her word, which is at this point worthless. She understood.

Our solution for this at the moment is for FWW to invite me to participate in her life more. Happy Hours and gatherings that she would previously go to alone (and meet OM) she is inviting me to these functions. We've already started this, and the good things about it are that they are fun and I get to spend time with FWW. However, I don't believe for a second that this means that these guys aren't potentially still a threat to our marriage. People have affairs under these circumstances, too.

MC pegged FWW's fear of intimacy right away. FWW said that the idea of a close, intimate relationship is not appealing to her, and that she has been working on that issue for years with her therapist. MC said that her concept of intimacy, where two people are attached at the hip who no longer have an individual sense of self and can't be apart from each other for ten seconds, is wildly skewed. And that true intimacy oscillates (she said she would explain this in more detail as we continue to work). She also said that FWW would make more progress in MC with her intimacy issues, because she will have to face them with me there. In IC, she can talk about it and around it eternally and never put anything into practice.

MC assured us both that although it may seem hopeless, and that we can't see the path to recovery and that we may not even be able to define what we want out of recovery, that this can work. She has helped hundreds of couples recover in her 20 years of experience, and we can too. She had no doubt.

This was more powerful to FWW than to me, only because I already knew this. But for her it was the first time someone (other than me) had told her unequivocally that this can be done.

We talked about a lot of other things that I can't remember, except that I'm going to try to back off a little and let her take ownership of her role in the family again, and try not to pressure her with any expectations. She's going to continue to work on getting over OM. She realized she still has a lot of work to do in that area, but she wants to get over him.

FWW has been loving and even kind of affectionate. We're communicating better and we're spending time together, and she's initiating much of it.

I'm officially (although still hesitantly) going to add a recovery date to my signature.

The last week has been really great. MC opened up some things between us, and Friday night we sat on the couch and talked and shared some things that got us connected emotionally and spiritually (not in a religious sense). That night she told me that she thought that everything we were doing was right, and that she felt closer to me than she has in a very long time.

Saturday we spent a long day together with DD. We were affectionate and happy, and we were having fun! It was great!

Since my MIL is in town, we decided Sunday to take advantage of the free babysitting and have ourselves a date night. FWW wasn't feeling too great, and I was nervous and a little worried. I could tell in my bones that this was going to be bad, but I didn't say anything, I just pushed those thoughts out.

We both agreed that we should just relax and enjoy ourselves, not talk about the situation, just have fun together. That was harder than I thought it would be. Dinner was awkward. We talked about a vacation that we had planned for October to go to a friend's wedding that got scrapped for obvious reasons (we made the plans a couple of days before D-Day). I guess the idea of planning a vacation together when things are still so fragile made FWW hesitant, and that in turn made me really nervous. The conversation was forced, and everything we talked about made the fact that we aren't fully committed yet plainly obvious. We couldn't talk about the past or present, and we couldn't talk about the future. It was so uncomfortable.

We skipped the movie and tried going to a dessert place, but that was worse. We were home before DD was in bed. How's that for a lousy date?

So we went from hopeful to hopeless in the space of a couple of hours. That is very scary to me. Plus, I'm not sure I understand what happened. Was it too much too soon? The pressure I was feeling was unbelievable--I felt like I had to make her as happy as OM did, that everything I did was being compared to him, and there was just no way for me to come out on top under those circumstances, or maybe under any circumstances.

FWW doesn't know what to do either. She said she is sitting tight and taking it one day at a time, continuing what we were doing with therapy and MC and just being patient. I guess that's the right outlook, I'm just feeling panic and worrying because it feels like we took two steps forward and 167 steps back.

I'm scared and I want to give up. Being around FWW right now makes me feel repulsive and incompetent and boring. I feel like she's ready to give up, and that makes me want to give up.

None of this makes sense, and I realize I'm contradicting myself all over the place. I guess that's how I feel--like a contradiction.

Maybe writing this out will calm me down, or help me gain perspective. That's what I've lost: perspective. Where is it?

Gah!

That's what I've lost: perspective. Where is it?

email me, I'll send it to you.

SS

ss(at)outdooroutlet.com

I think SS might just do that. He emailed it to me this morning. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Thanks! I emailed him and I'm anxiously awaiting a reply.

Today hasn't been any better. No change at all infact from her. I'm feeling better, but I don't really have any perspective yet.

I think FWW is going to aim for divorce at MC on Thursday. I'm trying to get myself prepared for that again. There was a week that it didn't feel necessary to think about it at all, but now it seems all too inevitable.

I'm going to try to suck it up and deal with the situation as it is and stop worrying. Easier said than done obviously, but it's about the only option I have right now, right?

It's funny how trust sort of started resolving itself by the two of us simply spending time together and being considerate of each others' feelings. I thought we were figuring some things out and making progress, and then, literally all of a sudden, everything reversed course. Baffling. FWWs mind is telling her something that she can't get past, I think it's "if we can't have fun, what's the point of trying?" I know the answer to that, but I can't be the one to tell her. Hopefully MC will see it, but I'm not even certain it's what's on her mind.

What's on my mind? What do I want? I want to continue to work on things and get past what happened on our terrible date and learn from it. Maybe that will happen, but it seems sort of hopeless right now.

It's tough on my psyche.

It's tough on my psyche.

Yes - it is.

I think your words were "this may be the toughest thing I have ever done."

Perspective - : the capacity to view things in their true relations or relative importance.

This is important. No doubt.
It's life changing, but not life threatning.

If we could see things as they really are, without viewing through the cloudy lens of emotion, what would we see?

Everything is relative. That's why PERSPECTIVE is different depending upon where you are located in what is being viewed.

You'll get up tomorrow morning. If you walk out front of where you live, you'll notice the sun in the sky, same as always. If you stand there for a while, you'll see people leaving or work. Life seems normal for them. Depends, of course on what is happening in THEIR LIVES.

You need to change your emotional perspective. You need to look at this event, but see it differently.

You need to live this so that 50 years from now, you can say "I did the very best I was able to do. I did all I was able to do."

You've seen an example of someone who stepped up, and changed the status quo. You need to be that in your marriage for the next year or so, or as long as she gives you.

Your situation won't change from you reading this. It will change only if you make it change. You have to run the marathon, pushing the wheelchair. It will come close to killing you, but you have to do it anyway.

I suspect you'll get tired of hearing this - but it's the only way.

Your W doesn't have faith. She needs to see your faith in your eyes every time she looks at you. She changes her mind daily, and weekly. You need to take the long view. You can change your mind a year from now, but for now you need to work your plan.

When she expresses doubt, you need to step up and tell her "I don't know if this will succeed, but I'm going to put my whole heart into making it work until the outcome is clear. I'll probably still try after that, as long as I think there is any chance at all. I promised you I would when I married you, and I'm going to keep my promise."

You need to believe it when you say it. (Or similar comments in your own words.)

When you come back and tell us things don't look good, we'll tell you "Yes, this is the way it often goes. Keep working on it."

Memorize it, and if you post when I'm not here, you can reply for me. (grin)

I'll be traveling on business beginning tomorrow (wed) afternoon. May be Monday before I can post again.

I'll be interrested in knowing how it goes on Thursday.

Plan for the worst - know what you will say, how you will react. However, expect the best. Hope for the best, act like the best will happen. If you want to be a winner, you have to act like a winner. You have to play the game a winner plays.

What's on my mind? What do I want? I want to continue to work on things and get past what happened on our terrible date and learn from it.

That is the attitude of a winner. Sure you will have doubts. Ignore them for now. Plenty of time for them later if the are needed.

If you need to, practice in front of a mirror. Tell yourself you can do what it takes. Believe it. It will show on your face, and in your voice. You'll feel it, and it will change you.

I want to see you make it. You want the same thing. It's all yours - take it and run.


SS

Thank you for the perspective. It helped. A lot changed pretty rapidly for me last week. The large part of it just calming down and getting over the anxiety. Monday was bad, Tuesday less so, and by Wednesday I felt like my head was back on straight and I was able to see things clearly.

That doesn't mean things were any better between FWW and myself. She was cold and irritable around me. So I just gave her room to be that way, and hoped that things would settle down.

Thursday brought MC finally, and we explained to her what happened. FWW said that things just got too close for her, and she had a backlash of just not wanting to be around me at all. She was annoyed whenever I was around and felt like she needed space. She felt guilty for wanting space though, and thought I would be mad or suspicious if she asked for it.

I told her that wanting space is okay, depending on what she wants to do with it. If she wants free babysitting so she can develop another relationship, then, no, that's not okay. If she needs space to get her head straight and contemplate our relationship and what her feelings are without distraction for a couple of days, that's understandable.

It so happens that we were planning on visiting the grandparents out of town this weekend, which was originally her idea, but now she was dreading it. She wanted me to take DD and go ourselves and give her a couple of days alone. And she assured me and MC that it was to think about our situation, not to have an affair. MC was concerned that I wouldn't trust FWW with this freedom, that I would be worried about OM, but I told her I really don't think that OM is an issue, and that I felt pretty confident that she was being sincere.

So that's what happened. We talked about some other things in MC, mostly FWWs fear of intimacy; her fear in general, and how it affects her, not how it affects me specifically, not yet. But it was a fairly productive session. I felt about the same coming out as I did going in, but it had a positive affect on FWW. She warmed up to me slightly, and we were able to at least be in the same room without too much awkwardness.

We're not communicating though. Not in any meaningful way. At this point, it's probably to be expected. We had a few days there that were great and we talked a lot, but I think that was unusual. What we're experiencing now is much closer to what we can expect for the foreseeable future. That's what I think anyway.

I guess that we're in this holding pattern ... no real progress other than the progression of time and not killing each other. I'm sure one of us will break and ask to talk sooner or later, but for now it's just ... I don't know, trying to get in the habit of being "checked in" together and develop some normalcy to our routine. Something like that.

Being patient and keep an appropriate distance (which varies daily). That's the basics of my plan now. Be a great dad and take care of myself. Not a very detailed plan, but I'm tired and worn down. That's about all I can handle today.

One thing I've noticed is that I find myself questioning my commitment to this more. How badly do I want to recover my marriage? How much do I love FWW now? I'm trying not to think about it too much, but I'm aware of the change, and that's enough for now.

Thanks for reading, and thanks for the advice. I feel more sane now.

It sounds like your MC is a good one.

Your strength will vary, that's natural. Just don't make any decisions on the spur of the moment. Always bite your tongue, and think a few weeks before big decisions.

Keep trying to do a good turn daily.
Not romantic
Not forced
Something you can do for her because you love her.
If you have those feelings of doubt, find something you do love about her. I'm sure you can find something if you think. Everyone has SOME good trait - even me. (grin)

Giving her a foot rub.
putting her shoes away.
Filling her car with gas
Sweeping the floor when it's her turn.
buying her favorite kind of grapes
washing her car
vacuuming her car
Getting her a car air freshiner
Coupon for a car wash
Ask her on a date, get the baby sitter in advance.

This is not a list of things you should do, it's a list to get you thinking some more.

Her feelings will change from day to day. So will yours. It's going to be hard for a while. It always is. Always.

Don't think that becasue it's hard that it won't work.
You may have noticed in your life...... that hard work is often the precursor of success.

Smile more, it's good for your face.

SS

The idea at this point is just to slow down. I'm trying (very hard) not to push things. I'm content to just get used to being around each other after what happened. Hopefully as the trauma fades we'll both be more open to working on this as a team. Right now, we've got to get past the ambivalence.

We're being nice to each other, and acting as if things are normal. I'm still more than a little distrustful because she hasn't been offering information about what's going on in her life outside of what we experience together at home. I'm not asking though. Just taking it a day at a time and focusing on myself and DD.

Anxious for time to pass, but feeling more patient.

Do you still wonder a lot?

SS

I've been (and still am) slammed with work, so I've been unable to dwell on things and wonder too much. Occassionally I catch myself getting worked up over the past, about what I don't actually know and am filling in the gaps with worst-case scenarios (if that makes sense). At those times, I get pretty close to throwing in the towel, thinking it's hopeless and why on earth am I putting myself through this. But it's usually just me alone at those times, so I don't take any action. The feelings pass.

MC yesterday was confusing and aggravating for me, but pretty good for FWW. She said she was feeling pressure to move things along to the next stage, toward passion that she isn't feeling. That we were like pleasant roommates, and that's as far as things seemed to go. She didn't think we were making progress. I told her that I thought we were making a lot of progress, that being pleasant roommates, working together to handle everyday issues, not thinking of the affair every time I look at her, her being "checked in" ... all of that was an improvement from where things were a couple of weeks ago, and much of that hasn't been a part of our marriage for months. I told her that IMO it was much too soon to expect much passion to develop between us. I said I thought it would be a long time, don't know how long, and it may never happen, but to expect it now was unrealistic.

Knowing that I didn't actually have the expectations she was assuming I had helped her tremendously. Knowing that I was working on things in my own way, helped her to realize she could work on things in her own way. Yes, we'll be doing things together, in fact I wouldn't be able to progress without her help, but we have differing perspectives. That's okay. As long as we share what our perspectives are, we'll progress.

She still doesn't believe that passion can return once it's gone. That's tough for me, but it's where she's at now. MC helped us both understand that where we are changes from day to day. The best thing she said to FWW was that she can't guarantee that passion will return for her, but she can guarantee that the chances are higher if we try (like we are) than if we give up, which has zero chance of working. That seemed to trigger something for FWW.

With MC's blessing, we agreed to lay off the relationship talk unless absolutely necessary or we both agree to do it. Save all relationship talk for MC. For now. I thought this was really good. It takes some of the pressure off.

After MC, FWW was concerned about me because I was somewhat perturbed initially after we left, kind of felt down about FWW's statement that she didn't believe this could work, and also just wondering if FWW was working on it for some reason other than that she wanted things to work. I was confused.

I went ahead and mentioned this to FWW, and she assured me that she's here because she wants this to work, not because she feels like she's supposed to, or because everyone expects her to. She asked what would make me feel better, and asked if I could cook. (Cooking seemed really attractive to me at the time.) She said of course, so I started digging around for some ideas in the kitchen.

Then, unexpectedly, FWW came to me and said "I thought this was self-evident, but maybe it isn't, and I've never told you, but I feel really terrible that I let the affair continue after you found out. I don't know if I would be capable of making a different decision if I were able to do it over, but I know it was wrong and I feel really bad about it." I told her I appreciated her saying that. That was it, I didn't harp on it. I really did appreciate it though. It shows that she's actually thinking about what I might be feeling. That's certainly new. For the record, a few minutes later she said "of course I think that having the affair in the first place was wrong, too, and I feel awful that it hurt you so much. I should have said that, too." She said this jokingly, and it was pretty funny. That's very us.

We had a great night, had fun and laughed a lot. Again, not getting too caught up in where things are, just being in the moment and trying to limit my expectations.

Is this typical? Is this a stage that all BSs go through? If so, what's next?

I should say that as far as passion goes, it's getting tougher. I'm feeling very attracted to her physically right now, and it's difficult to mask that although I'm doing a pretty good job. I know that this would put pressure on her, so I'm not saying anything, but SF and PA are feeling overly unfulfilled suddenly. I've been able to control it, but sometimes I just want to grab her and jump in bed. This has to be normal, so I'm not worried about it. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I think there IS progress over time.

Recovery happens in stages, it's not a single event.

She shows remorse SOMETIMES.
She spends time with you, continues to go to MC.
All these things are good.

Your feelings are natural.
Some women WANT to be grabbed............
Some don't.

You should know her well by now, which is she?

If she fits the NOT catagory, best to leave her alone.

Weekend went???

SS