I went & saw Hitman. I figured an action movie was better than a sad, chick flick.

It was ok. It kept my mind off of things for awhile.

Well, movies are great for that!

I was supposed to go see the Mist later with a friend. I'll post my review!

Hang in there,

Today was ok. I was really surprised when my therapist called me at home to check on me. I love her. She called on a holiday weekend. I was shocked.

I need to get my military ID card renewed & my husband is supposed to help me get a new one. But I don't know if he will.

I am also going to start looking for a commercial agent. I still want to keep pursuing acting. I love it so much. I watch movies/tv and I see characters that I could've been cast as.

My friend Ann called tonight. She is a swimsuit model & probably one of the most beautiful girls I've ever seen. She's also sweet as sugar. She's said WS was an idiot and he was blind if he didn't see what he had. Then she told me to stop defending him! He's a cheater she said. Told me I needed to be strong. We needed to go shopping! So tomorrow we go to Beverly Center and The Grove. Yes!!!

I slept pretty good last night. I feel OK this morning.

I think I will go and get my Jeep washed and gassed up for my shopping trip. I think I want to work this anger thing for awhile.

Morning LA!

Glad you got some rest last night... and I'm glad that you have a good friend to talk with.

Semper Fi,

RIF

Today was a pretty good day. I feel better. I had a good lunch and fun with my friend.

[color:"red"] [/color] [color:"blue"] [/color]

What to do?? multiple choice, up to 2 choices
	Do we stay
	Does he go
Votes accepted starting: 11/26/07 09:57 AM You must vote before you can view the results of this poll.

I checked out one online school for paralegal course & one regular school for a paralegal course. Nine months to become a legal assistant & 9 more months to become a paralegal. Don't know the cost yet. But seriously thinking of night school. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Also, left messages with 2 of the BEST headshot photographers in LA to see if they had openings at the end of December for new headshots. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Worked out with trainer this morning for 1/2 hr. Then 1/2 hr on the treadmill. Going back tomorrow too. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

Now I'm going to Target and maybe a movie. Therapist tonight at 5:45. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I feel like I have some control these past 2 days. Control over my moods & how I feel etc... I know you all know what I mean. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

You've been being very strong lately, that's great and I'm proud of you. Hang in there! You're doing the right thing right now by focusing on you, the happier you become with yourself, the better you'll look to WH (and everyone else, too).
All my best,
~Mark

I made my new headshot appt for December 12th. The photog is so busy that it was then or middle of January. So I'm going with 12/12 & then I have time to get them made up etc...

We'll see how I feel after I get home from therapist appt.

Therapist appt went well. She agree's with me that it's not right that he has not answered any of the ?'s about why he started the A and why he just says that our marriage is over etc... And she says I deserve answers to my questions. I think that he doesn't even know the answers himself. I explained about "the fog" and she agree's with that.

I wonder if I should stop contacting him daily or if I should continue to call, email & txt msg him? I'm torn about what I should do. He gets deployed sometime in Jan or Feb. I'm holding out a small bit of hope that once he gets over there and away from OW and his happy little bubble that maybe I can meet more of his EN's and work a better Plan A on him. I dunno though.

He's not acting like the man I married. When he says that he feels like our marriage was over in 1999 I feel that since he won't answer my ?'s he is just using this as an excuse to justify his behavior. Because he won't look at me. He won't look me in the eye. He feel's guilty. Ashamed.

And I know his family is just sitting there in the Midwest telling him horrible things about me, spreading lies, rumors and he may be vulnerable enough to actually believe it.

I finally feel that this isn't my fault. Since 10/3 I've been really blaming myself for all of this. Not now.

I haven't cried in 3 days. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

LA:

Sounds like you are doing much better. Why don't you just contact him when you feel the need to? If miss a day or two, perhaps it will let him know that you have other things in your life besides hanging on to him, and maybe a little detachment may make him wistful for what the two of you had.

And I think you are right about the deployment. It may be the thing that causes him to wake up and see what he is doing. I am sure that we he compares how often you contact him with words of love with OM, he will see what he is missing out on.

Great time of year to watch movies! Some of my all-time favorites are holiday movies. Just the other day some saw some of Christmas Vacation, and that always gives me a laugh!

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

There's the problem though. We never used to talk everyday. 3 or 4 days could go by & I'd be busy & he'd be busy & we wouldn't talk or connect. So I don't know if not contacting him everyday is a good or bad thing.

Today I am going to have lunch with friends and check out a college for paralegal courses. I'm trying to stay busy. There is a lump in my throat all the time & there are moments where I want to just crumble & start crying.

LA,

I have been following your posts, but not posted since you first came here. I am still wondering about the questions you never answered. I recall asking you how you could be separated for (was it 7 years) while you pursued your career and he his, and think the marriage would stay together. I never got an answer for that.

I am also puzzled as to why you NOW would go to be with him, if you would not have before. I know, one answer is that you are losing him now, and you weren't before.

I haven't offered you much in the way of advice because frankly I don't understand YOUR thought processes. His...I understand. Yours I don't.

You seem like a nice lady. You seem very focused on your career. You seem to enjoy your career. You also seem to not NEED much if anything from your H. Most of us guys NEED to be needed, and frankly you don't need him for a thing as near as I can tell.

What is it you need from your H if you only talked maybe every 3-4 days, and otherwise you two were too busy to talk??? What do you expect your H to provide you? How will your life be different if he is not in it?

Do you see what I am driving at??? He is in the middle of an affair right now and thus HE is not thinking about recovery. You on the other hand need to prepare for recovery if in fact your speculation that his deployment will end the affair.

Part of that preparation is you deciding what you really want and need from a marriage, and a husband. You also have to decide what it is you are willing to contribute to the marriage. I know you have discussed moving back to be with him, but that won't be for at least a year as he will be deployed. So the idea now is to understand how to construct a plan for recoverying this marriage. That plan MUST start with what you want out of the marriage and a husband, and then include what you feel your H would want out of the marriage.

Obviously the OW is meeting his need for someone to be with and talk to. I would guess she is meeting his SF needs as well. Perhaps she is meeting his need for admiration. I don't know. But you need to figure out what his needs might be and how you might meet them.

I know shopping will help your feelings of being down, but it won't create a plan for you,nor will it address what your H is searching for.

Please think about these things. There are tools here to help you rebuild your marriage and to help you end this affair. I don't recall hearing that you have exposed to family and to his commander although I know it was discussed, and you discussed it with someone near you.

LAsun, please consider the topics I have mentioned. Your marriage is not over, but it will not recover unless you have a plan for it and that plan needs to address the WHY's of the marrige before the affair.

God Bless,

JL

JL,

I don't know. I really don't. I didn't know I was messing up so bad. I thought that by having a career & being able to contribute was a good thing. I htought that when I left Georgia in 1999 that going back to Phoenix was a good thing because I could then get a better job. If I had known that he resented it I would've stayed and gone bankrupt and been penniless if that's what he wanted. He never said encouraging things to me so I didn't stroke his ego in return. He never talked and said anything and I eventually stopped talking and expressing my emotions to him because I just felt it wouldn't do any good. I felt like he didn't need me. So I put my energy into having a good job and pursuing my dream.

His family knows about the affair and they think I'm the most horrible thing ever. They have spread so many lies and rumors about me throughout the family that I don't know if he is listening to them or debunking them or what. And yes, I told his 1st Sgt & his Capt and they both just told him that he needs to communicate with his wife. They are cops and will cover for each other. None of them are any help.

And I do need things from my H. I always felt that if I worked harder, earned more, got promoted eventually he would say "good job" or say that he admired me etc... Which has never happened. He's never given me alot of encouragement. He's so quiet. He holds everything inside. But I still love him.

I don't know what he wants from a wife. Again, he doesn't really talk alot. And I've tried to get him to talk. Tried so hard. I've always asked his opinion on everything. And usually I get silence. So what am I supposed to do? Just not do it? I don't know.

I just wish he had said that he needed me, wanted me to stay or something like that.

I don't know if it's a sexual affair or just an emotional affair. Because he had been having problems these last 4 years with ed and I had tried to be supportive and just told him that it wasn't the most important thing. Just being with him was. But I still missed making love to him.

I know I've messed. I know that. I'd never read any books about marriage and what I was supposed to do or that there was a certain way to act. Yes, I've been selfish in my needs and wants. But so has he. His job always came first. I was always second. During out marriage he has been deployed, TDY or remote for a total of 5 1/2 yrs. 2 years out of the last 7 were deployed. I've never cheated, thought about it or even considered it. Always faithful to him.

Was I meeting his EN's? No. But neither was he. But I still love him. I have this feeling of comfort and safety when we are together.

I don't know what else to say. I know I've messed up and probably am responsible for driving him into this affair, but I'd like to try to fix these problems. I'm willing to give up everything for him. I feel so lost without him. Even if we didn't talk everyday, I still think about him every 2 minutes. Even just sitting next to him warmed my heart. I told him numerous times how much I loved and admired him. Even though I knew I was never going to get the same words from him. Always told him I loved him. Maybe I didn't say it enough. Maybe I didn't show it enough. I look back now & wonder if he didn't want the Suzy Homemaker wife that cooked dinner everynight and brought him a beer.

But I am lost without him and love him dearly. There is a hole in my heart and my soul right now that is nearly killing me.

I am unemployed right now & all I have is time to sit here all day long and reflect on how bad I've messed up. I know I'm not entirely responsible for this, but I wish he'd talk to me. He's thrown just as many LB's out there as I have. And I know I've been the one to get mad & snap at him and he just doesn't talk. I could beg & plead for him to tell me what he is thinking and feeling & I'd get silence.

So right now, I'm treading water & looking around for a liferaft and a way to save my drowning marriage.

Would I survive without him? Yes, I would, but I don't want to. When I got put in the hospital the last time, what got me put there was my comment that, "All I want to do is lay down, go to sleep and wake up in another time and place where the pain is gone." And boom, there I was in the mental ward.

The MC said he has detached himself from the situation because I have shocked him with my reaction. That my rapid weightloss, panic/anxiety attacks, shaking and weakened state are hard for him to comprehend and he's just shutting down.

I don't know what else to say. I know I'm rambling, but today was not so great. All my friends could ask about was this situation and it took a toll on me today. I thought I was so tough because I hadn't cried in 3 days. Well I fell off the wagon on the way home today.

LAsun,

Please reread my last post to you and then read your response to me. If you reread my post, you will notice I did not say you "messed up". You will also noticed that I didn't say a single thing bad about you.

You will also notice that I asked about YOU, and what YOU could do, and what YOU got out of the marriage. What I got back was defense and the "yes BUT he did it too."

You will NOT recover your marriage wallowing in self-pity or blame shifting. You will NOT recover your marriage if you think recovery is about blame. Recovery is about goals, it is about plans, it is about actions. You will not recover if you don't take good care of your health, sounds simple and obvious but it is often forgotten.

You will not recover by accident. You will only recover when you have a goal and one of those goals is to do things differently, more effectively, and powerfully.

One of Dr. Harley's major insights was that often well meaning and loving people fail to meet their spouses needs because a) they don't know what they are and b) they don't know how to meet them. Good marriages go bad this way.

Your marriage has been encumbered with almost 5 years or is it 7 years of separation. There is little chance you two even know one another anymore. So I am asking the beginning questions:

1. Do you know yourself?
2. Do you know your goals?
3. Do you know what you want in a husband?
4. Do you know why (in detail) you love your H?
5. Where do you think you could have done better in this marriage and what are your plans for the future?

In a nutshell that was what I was asking you before. I was trying to phrase it generally so that I might allow you to reflect on things in your own way, rather than pin you down with questions.

Feelings are great things, BUT they change, and they do not take the place of actions.

The other thing I thought I would offer you is to suggest that you read about love busters, the most deadly of all is the disrespectful judgement, DJ for short. DJ's are deadly because they are assumptions based on little or no data, thus when one acts on a DJ or evaluates using a DJ, the action and the evaluation is almost always flawed.

You said your H works hard and long hours and that is his focus. Then you also mentioned that you did not want to be bankrupt, perhaps he doesn't either, so he chose to work hard figuring it would meet your need for finacial support. Perhaps he was wrong and used a DJ himself.

I don't know.

But LAsun, this thread is about YOU, your thinking, your goals, and your plans. Your H is not here, so it is you the people here are trying to help.

Please reread those posts and let me know what you think.

God Bless,

JL

1. Do you know yourself? Yes, I do. I know that I am hard on myself & hard on other people. I expect perfection and doing everything right the first time. I have never, ever failed at anything I have ever set out to do. My husband is the exact same way. Probably more so than me.

2. Do you know your goals? My goal was to have an Oscar & a Tony award by the time I was 40. I wanted my husband to be proud of me & my achievements. I wanted him to be as proud of me as I was of him. I told him how proud I was & how much I admired him. From him, I got silence. Lots & lots of silence.

3. Do you know what you want in a husband? I want to keep the one I have. I feel a level of comfort with him that I have never felt with any other person in my life. My immediate family included. Even if we weren't together in the same house/apt or were continents apart, he was my comfort. And when I was with him, to just sit next to him brought me a sense of peace and well being.

4. Do you know why (in detail) you love your H? see above. I knew by the 2nd date that I would marry him. He accepted me as I was and never asked me to change myself. His acceptance meant so much.


5. Where do you think you could have done better in this marriage and what are your plans for the future? Done better? I could've done lots better. I could've questioned him more about what he wanted & expected of me. I thought by not being the jealous, clingy, stereotypical Air Force wife that stayed home all day & had one kid after another he wouldn't feel like other husbands and want to leave & get away. Didn't have kids because I wanted him only. I didn't want to ever share him with anybody. I know now that my career choices were the wrong ones. I should've just settled for a regular job and answered phones somewhere and gone home after work & made him dinner, because I have a feeling now thats what he expected. But since he would never talk much about what he wanted or needed I don't know if I'll ever know. My plan right now is to just get a grip on myself, try to get out of bed each morning and eat & drink something so I don't go back to the hospital. When he calls, be as calm and kind as I can. When he is deployed I pray that his fog will lift & he will consider a 2nd chance for us. But as the MC said last Monday to me, "One person can't save a marriage." I can try, and I will, but I don't know. Right now, I don't have a game plan written down. I barely remember what day it is unless I put a sticky note on the closet door by my bed.

I know you're not being rude or judgemental. But I don't have an exact answer to all of the questions. My friends all say that I am the strongest & toughest person they know. I scared them here these last 2 months. They have come out swinging for me. Right now, my thoughts are jumbled. Like I said before, I can barely get out of bed in the morning. I have to make a list for everything because I can't think. But I know I'd give up everything for him. I used to think, that if I made enough money & was able to be successful as an actor, he wouldn't have to work as a cop and I could keep him safe. He wouldn't have to work. I probably should've told him that more often. I can't imagine life without him. That's all I know.

LAsun,

I sitting her pondering what I can offer you. You need a plan and you need goals, detailed goals with respect to this marriage. Have you talked to your H at all? If so what has he said?

Your opinion of AF wives is a bit condescending I think. I fact I know it is. You have indeed chosen a different path, but the issue is it the path you want? If it is, then perhaps your marriage may be the price you pay for your personal goals. Things are rarely completely either/or. Usually things and relationships are more complex than that. Life is not about occasional phone calls, nor is it an "atta boy" from a distance. Life should be lived together and neither of you saw that as important until now.

I have no idea what your H is thinking, but I do know that you need to start some serious thinking about your marriage. One person cannot save it, but one person can change the dynamics so that it has a chance to be saved.

Has your H filed for divorce? Has he talked or asked for a divorce from you? Is he talking divorce now? or Pushing for a divorce?

He leaves in a few months for over a year. Even if the affair ends and he comes back in a year as your husband, what are YOUR plans. What in your heart do you want to happen? In the best of all worlds what would your life be like?

Please think about these things.

God Bless,

JL

All my husband said in the MC session on Monday was this exact quote,"I only came here so she would understand and finally get that it is over. I knew she'd be upset, but not this upset. Why can't she just move on with her life? I'm moving on with mine. I want a divorce and have already looked into it." **this is the only time he has mentioned that word**

But I went online & he has not filed for divorce.

My response was to shake uncontrollably, cry, sweat profusely and become so dizzy that I had to lay down. Major panic attack.

And WS is being deployed for 6 months. I have that amount of time to write, email, mail packages and try to be as supportive of him as I've always been when he is deployed. My hope is that I can finally get him to open up to me some and converse with him. My goal is for him to say that he wants to try to fix our marriage and that he wants me to move back to Tucson with him. Which I have no problem with.

And believe me, my opinion of AF wives is right on target. I have nothing in common with them. I have yet to meet one that I could hold a conversation with. It's why we always had our own friends. Never have we had the same friends. His were all military and mine were all actors, models & musician and the like. We tried to have a blended bbq once. Did not work out. His homophobe AF friends and my GLBT artsy fartsy friends just didn't work out.

And I have no idea what my husband is thinking. I haven't know what he is thinking most of our marriage. His sister defends him by saying he's a very private man. Yeah, so private his wife doesn't even know what he's thinking. But I still love him. You know that warm, fuzzy feeling you have in your chest when you first start dating somebody? Well I have that same feeling whenever I see him. And I get happy and giggly and just enjoy being with him. But sometimes I wonder if he doesn't find my happiness and laughter annoying? Maybe he finds it an annoying habit? I've learned to curb it alot when he's around. My friends call it the Stepford Mode.