Thank You MyAlias for taking a shot at summing up my story. I truely appreciate all that you have done for me over the last couple of years!
I will try to sum this all up (as short as I can). All situations are a bit unique and this one is no different.
I met my W in April, 1999 while I was on a business trip. I had asked her for her number and she would not give it to me, but said she would take mine. I was not going to be back in the area for another 3 months. The whole three months I never heard from her. Then on the weekend I was back in her area, she called me. We have been together ever since. We went on our first "date" in July and the following weekend I drove back to see her (8.5 hours) because I had been there for work the previous weekend. Well, I stayed at her place for this second weekend and we ended up conceiving our S due to a mix up with her B-control pills. So, we did not have the dating period that is so special to relationships. We went right into becoming a family. We used to talk for hours on the phone and it was wonderful, as we lived 3 states apart.
We decided that we loved each other and both would work hard to raise our S together. Since I was divorced from a previous M, W told me that we did not have to get married because she would understand if I did not feel like it because of what I had went through. We decided that she would quit her 2 jobs and move away from her family to live with me. We started looking for houses and after an exhausting search, found what we believed to be the perfect house in November 1999.
After putting a deposit down on this house, my job took a horrible turn a nd I ended up having to take another job in a different state. The only solice was that this state was the one in between both of us and it would mean that we would be closer to family (5.5 hours). However, it made things a little more stressful: baby on the way; new job; having to get out of a housing purchase contract; starting over without any family/friends in the state, etc..
We made the best of it and survived. Our S was born in April of 2000 and we were living in an apartment. I was working a lot of hours and W always told me this was ok because the financial security was the most important at the time because of our situation and she understood my rediculous travel and work schedule. We got through settling down with a temporary place to live for 2 years. We got through S being born. We got through a ton of my working hours. We started to realize shortly after S was born that SF started to taper off. This happened slowly and over a length of time. We would try and talk about it and W would tell me, "Its not you, it is me and I do not know what is wrong. I wish I did so that I could fix it."
So, I encouraged W to see doctors to try and help us. They found several things because W had a traumatic pregnancy and child birth. She had issues with her bladder, syatica (sp?), other nerve issues, head aches, back pain, neck pain. We saw several specialists. None we ever really able to help. They suggested she was depressed and we saw an MC that told her that she should just have sex with her H even if she did not feel like it. This MC lasted only a couple of visits and W was truely offended by her, especially since she never experienced child birth on her own.
Meanwhile, W decided she wanted us to build a house. We did and this is where we now reside. As we continued to move through several doctors, W's insurance ran out and it started to get expensive. We talked a lot about how it was amazing that we were able to work through all of these difficult things in life that would normally cause major marital problems, but we managed to make it through. We would take pride in how strong our R seemed to really be. I began thinking about our R quite a lot and knew that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with W. Well, I asked her to marry me in 2001 and we became married on July 27, 2002. I knew we still had issues, such as SF dwindling and I felt at times we were somehow growing slightly apart. I believed we could work through anything and that W was just as stubborn as I was and that we were both determined to get through all of this and make it work. W would always be our rock in our M and tell me that we are going to make it and it is all going to be ok. This would give me a lot of confidence in our relationship. I really had a deep love for W when she would sound so confident that we were going to make it through anything.
Anyway, SF continued to dwindle and we were on our second MC and W was prescribed anti-depressants. She seemed to come out of her funk from the anti-depressants and eventually weened herself off them. Unfortunately, the MC we saw could only see us every 1.5 months, which was not helpful. Also, these two MCs we saw were only about communication and not about falling back in love as a priority. This MC fell by the wayside.
About a year goes by and then I find out that W had communicated that she was going to meet up with an Ex on a trip back home. I confronted her about this and she got really upset with me for going on her email and checking up on her. In the past I had done this a couple of times and found out she had signed several emails to her "guy" friends as "Love." I confronted her on this and it blew up because of my invading her privacy. Now, it was years later and we are married and her she was setting up a meeting with an Ex and keeping it from me. Even though she blew up she said that it was because they were just good friends and that she knew I was jealous, mistrusting and controlling and that I would not be able to handle her meeting old friends. My argument was that I wished she would be open and involve me with these friends so that I am comfortable with them as well as known as "Your H." She said she was not comfortable doing this because of how i had reacted in the past (jealous, mistrusting).
When I found this out it was about 2.5 years ago. This is when I found MB and have been posting in the EN section. I also started going to MC on my own to try and fix "me" because I believed that things were my fault. I did not want to hurt W through LBing or being controlling, jealous or mistrusting. Eventually the C asked that I ask W to go. W did go for about a year, but this MC ended up being horrible and not really doing anything for us. She would pretty much just sit there and have us re-argue old arguments in front of her, which only got us more unhappy with each other. After a year, W did not go anymore. We had now been to 3 MCs and none of them were able to help us. She does not believe any of them can.
I maintained going to this MC after W bailed and I struggled on MB and tried my hardest to change my poor habits and tried to eliminate LBs. I was making good changes and progress with controlling, jealous or mistrusting behaviors. In fact, last October - January W made several trips home without me and I did not behave in a negative or poor manner towards her. I went away for a quick snowmobile trip in February without her, which was a first for me in our R. I encouraged her to participate in a girl's weekend away with her old friends, but she ended up not going. I even encouraged her to go to a family wedding last April, which I stayed home with S while she went for a week.
When she got back from her trip in April, I had re-read Love Busters for the third time and I found a couple as an example that really ressembled us. I felt it was a good and encouraging example because they were able to make it. [On my wedding ring, W had inscribed "To you I give my heart"] Her first night back I asked her if I still had her heart. She said, "Ofcourse you do!" This made me happy, but I could tell she had an uneasy look on her face and I was curious, but did not say anything. The next night we slipped into conversation about our R and I pulled out the Love Buster's book and she let me read the example I had found. It began by talking about how each person had lost their love for each other. W started to cry and then said that she completely agreed and feels that she has lost her love for me and cannot get it back. I felt this was encouraging because she was finally opening up. She told me that last night she felt bad because I actually do not have her heart anymore. She said she needed time and space to consider our M.
I go on my best behavior (as good as I could with this info) and try to be the best H. We actually take a trip to her parents together and everything seems ok. This goes on for a month. Then as circumstance would have it, I am near her cell when it rings and I knew she was waiting for a call from her sister. So, I go and pick it up to find a text from a guy in Phoenix! It is a very friendly text if you get my drift! I confront her with it. She admits it is her ex boyfriend (not the one I mention before) and that as circumstance would have it, he contacted her after she had booked her ticket to Phoenix and that she had lunch with him while she was there. I had checked her phone to see that they were talking all hours of the evening and 3 times a day. She swore they were just friends and that she kept it from me because she knew I would not be able to handle it. She also had lied to me about it being her sister when she was actually on the phone with OM.
We talked all night and W decided that our M was over and she wanted a D! I was crushed and hit from left field! This was around May 15. Since the beginning of January, I have been sleeping on a couch downstairs. This all started out because I snored and have sleep apnea. I had agreed with W to sleep on the couch until I was able to get this fixed to try and give her better sleep. I just had my CPAP May 14th and felt ready to sleep in our bed. W would not let me back in our bed.
I tried to talk with W regarding trying to recover our M and she would say, "I do not feel that way anymore and I know myself and once I feel this way there is no getting it back!" She also said, "I love you, but I am not inlove with you." I started speaking with Harley around this time and he asked me to give him 6 months. I agreed. I was actually able to get W to speak with Harley once, but she will not anymore because she feels I am trying to control her to speak with another MC and there is no point and when will it be enough since we already went to enough MCs. She told Harley that she knew her actions were hurting me, but half of her did not care. She also said this to me later. She also said she does not need me to emotionally support her anymore. She also said that her talking with OM has nothing to do with us and that our M is where it is because of what has happened in our past and my being controlling, jealous and mistrusting.
I tried everything I could to do a good plan A and meet the needs she would let me, which were not much. Harley has been having me try to maintain delivering her the message that there is a plan available that would allow us to fall back in love and save our M and that this would be the best thing for all of us including S, to have his mother and father in love and happy. I have been trying to deliver this message since May 15th and not too sure of the success I have had.
I would say that through mid July W was still saying that she did not have these feelings anymore and that she wanted a D. She has not said this since mid July in any of our discussions. In fact she has even mentioned at two different times that "if we make it" which makes you think there is a slight crack showing.
W went on a trip home for the last week of June through the first week of July. I believe the OM, since he is from the same area, was there at this time and that they spent time together. W also used to live with OM's family for 3-4 years and was friends with OM's M and OM's B. One of W's best friends who lives around there also used to date one of OM's Bs. W spent three days with this girl friend and supposedly stayed with this GF at her house. I have since found a hotel reciept for one of those nights and W does not know I know this yet. When W came home from this trip I found a love note in her purse that said, "I (drawing of a heart) you! Lots, Lots, Lots" When I confronted W with this she said it was a joke that her and her sister did to see if I would go through her purse. As far as I could tell she did not throw away this note!
She keeps her cell phone closer to her than her own underwear now. She sleeps with the phone on her waist even. She gets phone calls at all hours and texts. She has told me about contact she has had with OM's B and mom. Turns out as fate would have it, OM's B's GF was just killed in a traffic accident and has been needing a ton of counciling, even though W has only just begun renewed contact with this family. I will add some from my last post on the EN board:
First, here is a link to my latest thread:
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/sho...e=1#Post3045811Here is some of the latest information I had posted:
S and I did and it was fantastic. Ok, so now on for the roller coaster of a weekend. This will most assuredly be LONG.....
I get home Friday and we were invited over to a neighbor who is moving away in a week. They were having people around a fire pit in their back yard. W did not feel like going. I told her that I was going to go for a little bit and if she was not up to it that was ok. In the end, she decided to drag her butt there.
Before we went to the neighbors, W talks with me about her potential for a career. She says that she has seen these adds for her to get a degree in a year for medical billing and the such. I said, "Is that something that truely interests you?" She said, "No, but I could earn better money than I can right now." I said, "I am not going to stand in your way regarding what you want to do, but I do want to re-iterate the opportunity that you have in front of you. Right now, going after something purely based upon money may not ultimately make you happy. Very quickly, those types of jobs tend to be the ones that you end up hating and then feel trapped. You have the opportunity to pick something that really interests you and that makes you happy in the morning to get up for." She said, "EL, I am not comfortable going to college with a bunch of young kids and taking +6 years to get a degree. It does not pay!" I said, "If there is something that you really enjoyed and would like to do and it required years of college, you could work part time and go to school. The key is that it needs to be something that really captures your interest to help you maintain your focus over several years." W said, "I need something more immediate. What if we end up on our own? Things aren't good between us right now. What if you aren't around? What if something were to happen to you? Besides, you are always telling me that you are concerned about if something were to happen with your job that you would not know what we would do." I did not know what to think about what she just said. In a way I was glad to hear this because it shows she is somewhat grounded in reality. In another thought, one could think she may be entertaining the idea of moving further apart from me. We then talked about some options.
While we talked about options, W mentions something about a job feeling fulfilling. I mentioned that I totally agreed and feel that along the way I could understand if she lost some of her feeling of self-worth. I mentioned that I felt her loosing some of this feeling helped pull us further apart. W became a little defensive and then said, "No EL! What pulled us apart was you acting jealous and being mistrusting!" I said, "Ok. Well, its a good thing I don't act like that anymore." W also mentioned something that I cannot remember right now that was something that bothered her and I once again mentioned how I was glad I no longer did that anymore too. Both times W did not argue that I no longer do these things.
Later, we were sitting around the fire at the neighbor's house and W's phone goes off due to a text M. She reads it and then shows it to me. It was OM's B. It read something like: "Drunk I too much. Want to quit job." W responds with a text. Then nothing for a couple of hours. Around 12:00am she gets another TM and this time just looks at it, responds and then stares into the fire while putting her necklace into her mouth. She does not tell me anything and I do not ask. After 5 minutes, I ask her, "Is everything ok?" She says, "Fine." Then she says, "I am ready to go home. You can stay if you want." I said, "No, I am getting tired too." We go home and put S to bed and she goes to sleep in our bed and I try to fall asleep on our couch.
Saturday morning, we get up. I decide to make french toast for breakfast. W complains about how I am cooking and several things about my cooking breakfast. I just ignore her negative comments like, "You always burn the french toast" or "you do not crack the eggs right." [Incidentally, I have cooked for years. My mother had two sons and wanted to always have a daughter, but never did. Therefore, growing up, my brother and I had our own drawer in the kitchen that had our "special" cooking items in it. Mom would make us cook with her for hours. I am not trying to brag, but I have cooked an entire Thanksgiving meal with all the fixings myself one year and this is not a problem. I have also made several pies, with my specialty being pumpkin pie from scratch using a real pumpkin, not the canned crap! Therefore, W's negative comments about how I cook, which have ALWAYS been there since we met, are quite insulting to say the least. I have tried to talk with her about it and tried to find out what she would like me to do differently, but this has not gotten me anywhere and I have come to realize that she just feels like being negative towards my cooking efforts.]
I end up preparing a good breakfast and we all eat. Afterwards, W says she is not feeling well and did not get much sleep last night so she wanted to lay down some more. I decided to go to a book store with S for something to do. I was interested in picking up more info on triathlons!!!!
S and I get back from store and find W is now up. She wanted to veg on the couch and watch TV. So, S and I decided to read our new material (he got a Nick Jr. Magazine. His first. He has wanted one for a while ever since he saw commercials on TV. Boy, score one up for the advertisers!!!). So, we both read for a while.
We were invited the night before to our neighbor's house who has a pool. They will be shutting their pool down for the year soon and invited the neighbors over for a last gathering around the pool. Unfortunately, the weather was over cast and rainy. Nobody showed up, and we could tell because these neighbors were next door neighbors. So, I decided to take S over there for a little bit. Meanwhile, after W complaining about not wanting to go there and my telling her it was fine and that I would go with S, she came over for a little bit. While she was there, her phone rang with another TM around 2:30pm. She looked at it and replied and then acted as if nothing happened. I just let it go. Then W decided to go back to our house for a smoke on our patio. I saw her TMing on her phone again. She came back to the pool. While we were at the pool, I had went home and while I was there, thought enough to bring W a drink back, without her askiing. When I gave it to her she was thankful. Later on she walked back home to get herself a drink and did not think about if I needed one. She came back and just re-joined the conversation next to me (I did not have anything to drink).
A little later it started to rain and we packed up and went home. W went upstairs with S to change. I ended up texting a good friend of mine in another town who had just moved. He and I had a conversation going back and forth. I usually do not do a lot of texting and most of my texts are with W. Anyway, she eventually comes back and hears/sees me texting. She sits in the same room with me for about 10 minutes and then says, "So, you are getting a text!" I said, "Yep." W said, "Who is it from?" I said, "Mark. He just moved this past week." The TMs went on for a little longer and W said (being facitious), "He must really miss you!" I said, "Its only been about 20 minutes back and forth. Its not like the other night when you were back and forth with OM's B for 45 minutes." W said, "That is why I asked who it was because you ALWAYS ask who it is to me." [I can assure you, that although W may feel this way, this is certainly not the case. I have been trying my hardest to ignore them and if anything, I have walked out of the room before while it is happening because I do not want ANY part of it. So, I really did not understand why she felt that way.] I said, "I do not understand why you feel like that because I do not ask you about every text. I did not ask you who it was today at the pool and I did not ask last night at midnight. So, who were those texts?" W said, "OM's B." I just said, "Oh."
I spent the rest of the day reading and relaxing and S watched TV and read his magazine. W went on her computure and not sure what else she did. She was not feeling good and it was that time of the month again as well as she has gotten a rash that she first thought was poison ivy, but not sure. Later on S was upstairs and had fallen asleep on an upstairs couch. W and I were downstairs together in our family room. W was saying how there was nothing on TV. I mentioned that we could rent a movie and that we had not done this in a long time. W said, "Well, I'll look around and if I don't find anything I guess we could. You ALWAYS want to get a movie when it is really late!" It was 9:14 pm pm a Saturday night!
Anyway, W did not find anything on regular TV, but then found Spiderman 2, which had been on for 20 minutes already. W ALWAYS gets upset if we try to watch something that has already been going on. W says, "I suppose you have seen this several times already. I have not." I said, "Yeah, I watched it with S a couple of times." Besides, W is now saying multiple times a day how she is just so sick of cartoons being on all the time that it is driving her crazy and now she wants to watch a movie of one????? She ends up putting it on. Initially, I felt the inconsiderate slap of the whole thing that just happened, but I quickly ignored it and decided that I would rather read some of my new books anyway. So, I turned my back to the TV (laying opposite to it on the couch/my bed) and read a book on triathlons.
At 11:00 W gets up and says, "Well, I am going to go upstairs now." I said, "Ok. I hope you have a nice nights sleep." W said, "Thanks." Then she went upstairs. I kept reading. W came down a couple of times for things like a snack and a smoke. I watched TV and read my book. I was almost asleep at around 2:00am when I hear our front door open and close. I get up and walk outside to find W sitting on the porch wide awake. I said, "Having trouble sleeping?" She said, "Yeah, I just can't sleep and it is bothering me. I do not know why my sleeping patterns are off." She has had this trouble over the last week and I have remained supportive. However, finding her so wide awake at 2:00am, I began to get a flash back to a couple of months ago when I supported her through a bad sleeping period where she went and spent a ton of money on Dr. visits and sleeping pills and I stayed up and talked with her at night and was on this emotional "not sleeping" roller coaster only to find out it was actually self-induced with phone calls to OM in the middle of the night. I determined inside of me that I would not be able to be supportive if this was actually the case again. So, I flat out asked her. I said, "Are you not able to sleep because of being on the phone in the middle of the night?" [I told you I had almost already been to sleep and so, this was the best I could do at 2:00am] She got pretty defensive and said, "No! I am not on the phone! I have not been on the phone at night for months!" I said, "Ok, I just had to ask because I felt like quite the fool last time I was trying to be supportive about your not getting any sleep." W said, "I told you I have not been on the phone at night for a while! Besides, I was on the phone at night before because I could not sleep!" I said, "Well, that does not make any sense because I am here and always available for you to talk. Even if I am asleep, I am fine with you waking me up to just talk or sit with you." W said, "I am not going to wake you up if I can't sleep!" I said, "Actually, I would prefer you did instead of making phone calls. I am your H and willing to support you during rough times like not being able to sleep." She said, "Ok." Then she went upstairs and I went back to bed on the couch.
Sunday morning we get up and I am planning to take S to the air show. When I had asked W earlier in the week she did not want to commit and said she would make her decision based upon how she felt on the day. I knew in the back of my mind that this meant there was a 4% chance she would actually go. I told her when she told me this earlier in the week that I was still going to take S. Well, she told me she was still not feeling good and did not want to go. She said she was going to stay home and clean. I just said, "ok." I called up a neighbor to see if one of their kids S's age wanted to go and it turned out the neighbor and his 3 kids wanted to go. We made a day of it. W did not call me and I did not call her. The kids had a great time. At around 2:30pm, the neighbor called his W to let her know about when we would be home. I started to think that this was a good idea and that despite where W and I were, it would be the right thing for me to call and tell her when we would be home.
It just so happens that to this point all the planes were acrobatic small quiet planes. As W answered my call, an F-14 hit it's afterburners right above me and we could barely hear each other on the phone. W wanted to get off the phone right away and I had not even had the chance to give her the info I called for. W told me she had talked with the neighborlady (one who is seperated from her H and was our neighbor). This neighbor invited W over because W told her she was bored. W said she might go over. [well, she is bored because she chose to not go with us - duh!] Anyway, when W said she was going to hang up and I had not yet had the chance to tell her when we were going to be home, I said, "How come you want to get off the phone alot with me these days?" W said, "I see you all the time. Do I have to just sit on the phone with you?" I said, "We used to have some of our best conversations on the phone." W said, "I see you all the time and besides I can't hear you because of the plane!" I said, "We are going to be home around 5:30pm." W said, "ok." I hung up and was dissapointed in the phone call. I was dissapointed in myself.
We got home and S and I were hungry. I told W that S and I were going to order pizza and asked if she would like anything. She did and so I order for all of us. We had dinner. W had some TMs, but I do not pay much attention to these anymore other than to just realize she is getting one. S watched TV, I read and W went into the hot tub. Then we decided to make S read (he has so much time he is supposed to be reading per week). Then we played one game of "go-Fish" as a family. Then we put S to bed. W went and crawled into bed early (9:15pm). Usually, in these opportune moments, I would climb into our bed and watch a couple of hours of TV next to her. This is my way of kind of trying to get her used to us being in the bed together, but I really just did not feel like it. I went downstairs and did some chores.
Side Note Pertinent to rest of story:
[The previous weekend we had all our neighbors over for a cookout and there were two chairs left on our patio (the folding in a bag type). We thought they were this one neighbors. All last week we kept forgetting to bring them to this neighbor's. Friday night, I brought them to the neighbors. Turns out, Saturday, the neighbors tell us that those chairs were not theirs. W picks them up this yesterday. Last night, I go into the garage to see a couple of chairs on our golf cart and I knew they were not the chairs that I had brought over to the neighbors on Friday. I thought the neighbor's had given W the wrong chairs. It turns out, W had the right chairs, but they were in her car. The chairs I saw, were actually ours and I did not reckognize them! Silly me!]
Anyway, I go upstairs because I know think this whole thing with the chairs has gotten way silly. I say to W, I think you brought the wrong chairs back from the neighbors. She says, "No! I did not!" I laughed and said, "Ok, but they were two different types of chairs and the ones I saw were the same." W got upset and said, "No! I brought the ones back that you brought over. I know because I carried them from our patio to the garage after the party!" I said, "Ok. Its strange, but ok." W got more mad. I said, "What?" W said, "I told you I brought the right chairs back and you would not believe me and you laughed at me!" I said, "Wait a minute. I laughed because I think the whole thing with these chairs is funny. I was not laughing at you. I am sorry if I made you feel that way. I also conceeded that I did believe you, but did not understand why I was confused." W said, "You are making excuses. You do not believe me and laughed at me. So, what, were you looking into my car or something to see the chairs?" I said, "What? The chairs I saw were on the golf cart. Uh-Oh! I just realized the chairs I saw must be our chairs. What a moron I am! I made a mistake." W said, "Yeah! and then you laughed at me would not belive me." For the entire part of this conversation I was in a funny/laughing mode because it was silly and about chairs and I found the whole thing to be humorous. W was in the mood of upset, angry and wall building.
I said, "I was just finding the whole thing funny and came up here to have a laugh with you. Why can't you give me the benefit of the doubt on this. I feel like you do not give me the benefit of the doubt in situations anymore and seem to think the worse when it involves me." W said, "Oh, so now, I'm supposed to be in a joking mood with you. I called you a name when we were playing cards one night and you got upset. I was joking and so now I do not do that anymore." I said, "That was over a year ago." W said, "It was last year." I said, "Right. Why do you keep bringing up things from a long time ago? These are things that I have already acknowledged as my having been wrong. I have apologized and made corrections in my behavior to guard against these things from happening in the future. I cannot change the past, but I certainly can change the future. I just do not understand why these older things keep being brought up." W said, "You want me to tell you how I feel. Now, you don't want me to tell you how I feel. You said you have changed two years ago, but you haven't." I said, "No. I am not going to follow this and allow myself to be pulled off of our original discussion. The point we are discussing is your giving me the benefit of the doubt. Two years ago, I told you I finally realized how my bad behavior was hurting you. At that moment I vowed to change this behavior because I did not want to hurt you. Since then I have been working on changing myself for me too. I have made some significant changes, but I will still make some mistakes as I am human."
W said, "That is where you just make mistakes and are just trying to justify why you did something. You do not accept when I tell you you did something bad." I said, "I have been confused with this concept for quite a while and I think I am starting to finally get a better understanding. First, let me start by saying that I would NEVER do something knowing that it would hurt you before I did that action. For example, I know that if I called you a name, say a bit** right now, this would hurt your feelings. Therefore, I would never call you a bit** because I do not want to hurt your feelings. Do you understand what I mean?" W said, "Yes." I said, "Great. Now suppose I do something and it hurts you. First, you will react somehow because I hurt you, but now you know that I did not do this with the intent to hurt you, right?" W said, "Right." I said, "Ok, so if I did some action and hurt you, but was not trying to hurt you and you react hurt, I become confused because we have just established that I would not have done it if I had already knew it would have hurt you. We are both similar people because we do not blindly just accept what anyone else tells us. We need to understand things, right?" W said, "Right." I said, "Ok, well, how can I ask for more information about how I hurt you without it sounding like I am trying to justify my hurting you?" She said, "Just ask." I said, "But that is not working for us because I feel I am already trying to do that. In order for me to ask and learn, I feel I need to offer you the thought path I was on just before I hurt you so you could see where I was coming from. Unfortunately, this must feel as though I am trying to justify my actions, when in fact, I am trying to learn from them. So, how can we do this in the future so you do not feel I am ignoring you and trying to justify my actions?" W said, "I don't know." I said, "How about givng me the benefit of the doubt that I am not out to hurt you originally and that I truely care about learning from my actions to not hurt you in the future?" W did not say anything.
W said that she did not go to the funeral because she knew I would throw a fit. I said, "No. I am not going to accept the blame for you not going to that funeral. I did nothing to cause you to not go." W said, "You made all these plans and would have been angry." I said, "True, I would have been dissapointed if you would have went to the funeral because for one thing you did not know the girl. Secondly, you would be going to support a person(s) that I do not know and you do not want me to know or be a part of." W said, "What does not knowing the girl have to do with anything?" I said, "It was HER funeral." W said, "That does not matter." I said, "I feel it does." W said, "Its just because YOU feel it is different because of who these people are. HIS family!" I said, "You are right." W said, "If it was my friend Angie's boyfriend who had been killed I would have been there in a second." I said, "And I would have supported you 100%. Heck I would have offered to help drive you there." W said, "Yeah, right! You would have had a problem even with that." I said, "Actually, I would not have." W said, "I do not understand why there is a difference between these people and Angie." I said, "Because they are connecteded to him. Because you are guarded against my involvement with them. Because you began your relationship with them out of lies and deciet. Yes, you bet I have a problem with your relationship with them."
Then W says, "See, I knew this was going to turn into a circular argument!" I said, "No, I am not letting this go there again. You bring up a circular argument and this tends to again throw us off subject. I am not going to follow you there this time. We are discussing something and trying to find a solution for some of our issues. I got up to go downstairs and W made a frustrated gesture and aimed her arm at the TV and said, "Now, I've missed it!" She was reffering to the first 30 seconds of a show starting at 10:00pm. This bothered me because she did this most of the time we have a discussion. It gives the impression to me that the TV (whatever show it is because it is not just one show once a week that she is waiting all week for) is way more important than discussing our M. So instead of walking away, I say from the doorway, "Ya know, this is something else that I have a problem with. You get upset because some of our talks end up interfering with TV. Its as if TV is more important than discussing our M." W turned the TV off and got up and went outside. Knowing better, I followed her. Things seemed to be going ok. I had remained entirely calm throughout this discussion so far. I did not raise my voice. I did not allow the conversation to deteriorate off topic. W did put up walls and was yelling at some points and came across as defensive. I figured, what the heck EL? If I could keep myself calm and truely discuss things, then I should go for it, but be respectful if she says she wants to stop.
So, I go outside and sit down on the porch. W said, "I invited OM's B to come visit us. I am trying to involve you. But, now I do not think that is such a great idea as he is getting all weird right now. I tell you when I talk with OM's B and OM's M. I'm not keeping things from you." I thought about it and could no longer hold off asking the question I wanted to ask for months, "So, are you still talking with OM?" W said, "A few times." I said, "You never told me about these times." W said, "I did not think you could handle that." I said, "Don't you see that you are not letting me have the chance to handle my own feelings? You are deciding for me how I am going to react and then deciding how to act around me based upon your assumptions. This creates suspicious behaviors on your part, which enable my past porr habits. You are enabling my poor behavior by not allowing me to react to things." W did not say anything.
Then I said, "What is happening is that you are establishing an independent life style." W said, "I should be independent. I am not going to allow you to control me. I am going to spend time with whomever I choose." I said, "Do you understand that I do not want to control you. I no longer have any desire to try and control you. I am not interested in controlling you. I am interesting in you being who you are and my getting the opportunity to be a team with you, who you really are." Then there was a pause and I said, "There is good independent behavior that is conducive to a good marriage, like going and having your girl's weekend together and there is an independent life style that is not conducive to a marriage at all and that includes lies and deciete and many hours with Exs." W said, "Good and bad independent behavior? It comes down to you trusting me. You have never shown me that you trust me." [This statement is what makes me agree with you that she is a "lumper" and is lumping ALL forms of independent behavior together as good] I said, "I do not understand why you are saying that I NEVER showed you trust. I had been working on this for a while and things were actually coming together. There were several trips you took between last October and last February to your family and friends and I did not go or have a problem with it. Then in February, I went on a snowmobiling trip, which is something you encouraged me to go on. Then I encouraged you to go on a girl's weekend, but you chose not to. Then I encouraged you to go to Phoenix on your own. That was trust, ultimate trust and look what happened!"
I sat there for a while and did not say anything. I kept thinking, is this really a good time to bring up MB weekend? Something told me to hold off. I looked at W and said, "Honey, Have I hurt you in the past? - YES; Do I reckognize how my actions have hurt you in the past? - YES; Do I want to continue to hurt you? - NO; Have I made significant changes both mentally and physically as well as eliminating my hurtful actions? - YES; Will I make mistakes in the future? - YES; Do I want our marriage to work? - YES; Do I want to be a team member with you? - YES; Do I want to stop sleeping apart from you? - YES; Do I want to walk around on egg shells around you? - ABSOLUTELY NOT; Do I want to put more pressure on you? - NO WAY. W did not say anything, she just sat there. Not sure if she actually heard what I was saying, or just waiting for it to end.
Then I said, "I hope you understand that I came upstairs tonight to joke with you about a couple of chairs and I did not intend for this to get into this discussion." W said, "Ok."
Then we went to bed.
---------------------------------------
Yesterday, I finally ended up in the situation to bring up the MB weekend again. W and I were looking our calendar in the kitchen and she was trying to figure out when she could meet with her GFs in her home state. She figured there were only two weekends left in October and one of them happened to be the MB weekend. I mention that this last weekend is the weekend I was hoping we could go to the couples weekend and learn about a solid plan to restore our love for each other. W says, "I already told you I don't want to go." I said, "When we last discussed it you said you would think about it." She said, "You wanted me to think about it. I do not want to go." I said, "Why, you keep asking me what this plan is about and it would be a great opportunity to learn about the plan?" W said, "Because, I don't want to." I asked again, "Why?" W said, "I was not comfortable and did not like speaking with him (Steve Harley). I am thinking about going to see Barbara." This through me for a loop as Barabara is the last MC that we had went to. W was not happy with her because she never seemed to help us or really do much for us. In fact, W only went a year in the middle of my two years with Barbara.
Then in April, after almost 6 months of not seeing Barbara, W made an appointment that I did not know about at first to see Barbara. When I accidentally found out about it, W said, "I am seeing Barbara because I did not want to be accused of not working on our M." I thought this was wonderful and it gave me hope. Well, when I found out about OM on May 15th and we stayed up all night discussing things, W said, "I even went to Barbara to see if she would be able to get it through to you that I no longer loved you and did not want to be married to you anymore." W only went the one time in April to Barbara.
Now, she mentions going to see Barbara again and is not interested in looking into MB at all. I believe she may have said this to just shut me up. Maybe she meant it, I don't know. Only time will tell. Then, even if she meant it, I am not sure if it is actually a positive or not. In a way, W seeking ANY kind of counciling is good. However, I can't help but feel that based upon her past with Barbara, that she is going to see Barbara to ask things like, "How do I leave him? How do I deal with our S?"
Anyway, after she told me about Barbara, I said, "I just want to work together as a team to find a plan that would help us to restore our love for each other and allow us to recover our M." W just said, "It is not appropriate to discuss this now and we will have to wait for later." S was in the room with us.
However, later on, I did not think pushing this delicate subject last night was a good move. Besides, I was tired and needed to get some other things done as well.
So, hopefully the above information offers enough for you guys to be able to help me out some. I really value your experience and need to hear from those that have gone through this WW and "fog speak" crap.
Thanks in Advance,
EL
