What the heck? And my wife still says she's so resentful and angry at me. For what?!! Last night she brought up that she tried so hard to find a dress that I liked, and I had not appreciated it... I always thought she looked amazing. She's brought up things from years ago that she still hangs onto. It's true, I'm an insanely picky person and I'm sure it's a total pain to live with as a spouse sometimes. It is something I must learn to stop. But I don't bring up the countless times she'd disappear for hours with no clue where she was. The countless bad moods and short tempered outbursts I got to endure for 10 years. Her complete lack of patience with me, our kids and other people at times. The truly over-the-top embarrassing things she says when she's drunk. The ridiculous double standard she had for flirting. Trusting her to go out with men falling all over her and her telling me it's nothing. I don't hold onto these things because in the picture they didn't matter to me. On the one hand I guess it's natural if she's disillusioned with the marriage... on the other hand, what right does she have?!! Why did she let these things build to this breaking point and I didn't? She spent the last however many months turning me into such a bad guy. There were the problems raised before the affair, then there were the things said during the affair. I turned into a controlling creep with my kept wife at that point. I got to hear some pretty terrible things about me from the OM's friends. Argh.

ZW,

Talk to her about accepting gifts. Not the don't... stuff. But, here is something that is implicit in recovery and in meeting peoples needs. They have to be willing to accept the "gifts". You meeting her needs is not a given or even required. It is a "gift" you give her because you want her happy. Her meeting your needs is not a given or required,it is a "gift" she gives you.

For a marriage to recover you two need to learn to accept gifts, acknowledge the gifts, and discuss if the "gift" is really the right color. Seriously, the basic tenant of Harley's approach is he recognized that often well meaning couples try and meet each other's needs but fail, because they don't know what the needs really are, assume that their spouse would want them met in the same way as they would, assume their needs are the same as ours, and finally have no clue how the spouse wants the needs met.

So when you discuss meeting needs, you need to discuss accepting gifts, because often the greatest gift you can give someone is to accept their generousity with grace. The operative word is grace.

You two need to discuss what "grace" means to you. How to accept and appreciate one anothers gift of meeting needs, and finally how to discuss if the spouse is trying but missing the mark. These are NOT negative discussions. Oddly, they should be positive discussions and actually rewarding discussions for both of you. You two should POJA having this discussion as a positive affirmation of your actual love for one another.

There are even positive ways to ask the questions. "If you were running the world how would I meet your needs?" "If you were running the world how would meet your own needs?" Don't make it about accusations but about goals and dreams.

My guess is your W is very very fearful that she will fail, hence her controlling and withdrawal of things. She is much like many of us guys who are not comfortable in a discussion about emotions and feelings. Oddly, she failed in a big way because she was trying to protect herself and would not talk to you. ZW, you must understand that as much as you fear she will fail you and your family, she has even bigger fears about herself and her capabilities.

You need to find out what she fears, not just failure but what deep down she fears. You don't know this but I think you are getting it, you are the stronger one here. You hurt big time, but like a good old "timex" watch, you "can take a licking and keep on ticking". Your W isn't that strong hence her need to control, she fears she cannot "take a licking and keep on ticking."

You are not her counselor ZW, but you are her H. She MUST feel safe in your presence, in your arms, in your life. I know you don't feel safe, but you know things about yourself that she does not know about herself.

So hang in there discuss giving and receiving gifts and see if slowly ever so slowly you can begin to put this back on basis where you are not sitting on opposites sides of the table discussing what is between you, but sitting besides one another, discussing what is on the table.

God Bless,

JL

Ugh, now I already feel bad about venting in that last post.

JL,

As usual, your advice is excellent. This question of strength... a HUGE reason that I want to save my marriage is because I believe she's capable of that strength. She's done the impossible with me regarding kids and our life together. She's given me so much of my confidence. I know she has it. The fear is that she can't access it because of patterns in the past or emotional stumbling blocks or insecurity or guilt or whatever else. You're right, I absolutely don't want to be her therapist. I don't mind being her leaning post though. I just wish I knew that she could return the favor some day. I hope that she will learn to weather the hard times, because they're inevitable. That's my fear. That's the gamble. I know it's in her. Will she use it?

ZW:

Do you see in your post that "because you did, I did" thinking?

How about this:


We are guys. We don't bring that stuff up. We let it roll off our back, and move forward. Women REMEMBER THAT STUFF FOREVER.

And when the time suits, out it comes of the W.

And then us guys retailate by defending ourselves and laying a broadside about what "YOU DID" so long ago, or not so long ago, as it were.

About the dress? She couldn't find one that you liked? Because you said she looked "great" in all of them. You may have to be more open and honest with her in the future. Flamingo and I are. I just tell her..."that doesn't work on you..." and she puts it back on the rack or gives it away, if she owns it. Really. Guys should never answer the question: "Does this make my butt look fat?" I do. Because if I don't like how it looks on her, and she wears it, and I don't respond favorably to it, then she can't feel good about herself, and how is that making things better?

And about things from years ago? After Dday, Flamingo and I had many discussions about outstanding resentments and grudges from the years past. And Flamingo had ALOT. The interesting thing? Having learned about MB, we FINALLY talked about these resentments. She LISTENED and heard my side of the story for the first time. Her ONLY correct answer to these were HERS. Mine were never valid. It was only through what we learned at MB that we finally were able to address so many of these long-standing issues. Many of them have been resolved to both of our satisfaction. I addressed mine with her, and she addressed hers with me. Its made a world of difference.

And this:


She can't drink anymore. She can't handle it. Either A/A for her, and Al-Anon for you.

And this:


OF course, she could flirt. She wanted that admiration. She wanted to be the bad girl. She wanted to be the center of attention. And loose women will ALWAYS attract the attention of men. There is being charming, and there is being "available" with a capital A. And WW lived that life. Maybe what she wanted was you to protect her from herself.

Both of these are EP that need to be established by Coho, and expected by you to continue this marriage. No drinking. No flirting.

Both of those behaviors lead to your WW in compromising situations.

It's not controlling, it's protection. And when Coho realizes this, she will have taken a big step towards earning her "F".

LG

ZW,

Ya know ZW I have been married for well over 30 years. And since I found MB I have learned to appreciate something that stated here often but is not really well stated. You will hear that love is a verb/an action, something we do for our spouse. It is why we can promise to love someone through sickness and health, till death do us part. The love promised is not a "feeling", it is action and we control the action.

Now if you think about this just a bit you will realize that if we control it, if we give it, then if there are "bad" times, it should NOT affect our love for our spouse. In short, there can be a lot of stress, there can be financial problems, there can be family problems, and all of these are HARD TIMES. But, when it comes to love, there is no need for "hard" times. There is no excuse for "hard" times.

Sounds strange??? Consider Harley's admonition to "meet your spouses needs". He is saying clearly that you should act "loving" toward your spouse, without regard to outside issues, and there WILL DEFINITELY be outside issues.

The thing I learned here, is that I CONTROL whether there are flat times in my marriage. If I "love" my W, if I meet her needs, there are no flat times with regard to her knowing that I love her. No flat times with regard to me acting with kindness and grace toward her. No flat times with regard to her knowing she is desired in my life.

The "bad" times are not inevitable ZW and there is no free pass for making the times bad.

You and your W need to get this through your head if you get NOTHING ELSE. You to control whether or not you love your spouse. You two can and should love your spouse as you promised. It makes no difference if someone is "feeling" bad, it is your and your W's job to love one another and that is a VERB, an action, something you both have full control of.

Now I don't know if your marriage will make it or not, but I can assure you that if you two decide to actually take control of your own behavior, and decide "love" one another, more often than not you two will "feel" in love with one another. But, no matter how you feel or she feels, if you love your spouse as in the verb love, she will know it.

Please think about this and discuss it with Coho. Tell her an old crusty Dude :coo: told you two straighten up and to tell you two to decide to act loving toward one another. There is no excuse not to, certainly no past actions excuse not doing so as long as you two are married.

Print this one post out and show it to her. You two need to talk about this along with the concept of accepting gifts. She is still in the fog and defending, but that will end as she learns what she needs to learn here.

God Bless,

JL

Thanks JL - by 'hard times' I meant money troubles, kid troubles, parents dying, economy collapsing... I just want her to be committed to the marriage despite all these. I am. I'll digest and share your posts with Coho. Thanks.

Hey Zen,

got 'em, no jobs in 2 months.
my (then DD16, now) DD17 dropped out of school and is pregnant to a 23 yo unemployed, criminal who also has MS
Yep, had that during the A
yep, got that too.

The M and it's recovery is the top priority
I'd settle for commitment. Everything else is just filler

This is issue of strength is at the heart of it for me... After 5 years of marriage with so much at stake with so little wrong or expressed wrong in our marriage (from my perspective), how could she be willing to just dump it? This idea of an 'exit affair' is absurd to me. Telling friends before the affair that she has some disillusionment, then after the affair, “I’m in a dead marriage”. The level of disillusionment she expressed to me pre-affair was HARDLY grounds for an exit affair a month and a half later. I even read an email of hers at one time telling a friend that she had brought up issues with me and they were getting better. When I bring this up now, she is amazed that I couldn’t see how bad it was. Again, I accept her complaints, I own up to the changes I have to make, but to want to end the marriage and in such a distorted and way? I feel like she's saying two different things: "Without prior thought, I took off with the OM" (first hookup). Then, "I had an affair to end the marriage." Is this fog? Am I missing something? Frankly, the betrayal of an affair as a result of a loosening of boundaries and the 'I wanted to end the marriage so badly I wanted to destroy it with an affair that I sought out' are vastly different things to me and she's saying both. The latter is far more hurtful to me. Then to sit on the fence for months... (I still don’t think she knows the strength it took me to get through that time – the toll it took was/is astounding to me) to be working on the marriage up to the day when she told me it was over - the night after her friend said she was going to tell me... To keep coming back over and over... It's so freaking confusing.

What does an affair accomplish to end a marriage? It is 100% destructive. This was an affair in every sense of the term, but it was being couched in a 'moving onto a new relationship/serial monogamy' way. She’s still doing that. If that's the case, why the lies and secrets? I feel like she's still lying to me and herself with her motivations. I'm just so confused. This is easily the hardest issue for me. That she could truly be done with the marriage. But then she's here, so her actions show otherwise... That's why I don't trust her motives. This coincided with her losing her job... is it just security she wants? When she gets a job again will she just walk out again? She hasn’t even touched on what her view of marriage is. If she even meant the part about ‘good times and bad, sickness and health.’

I just don’t understand. If someone would tell me this is just an affair, it was a horrible mistake because she let down her guard, I'd get it. I probed her on that question and she told me it WAS all just a horrible mistake. Still saying two things. An 'exit affair' I don't get.

This is what I fear. That she doesn't have the strength to weather the hard times. That in both her marriages of a similar length, she couldn’t hang in there and blamed her husband for both. She’s going to read this and I’m sure it will be hurtful, but I need some answers to this. JL, maybe you’re right, I won’t get any real perspective for months. I hope that’s the case. Maybe I just don’t want to hear the answers. At least not now.

She's still keeping up the great attitude. She's really working at this and making me feel OK. I'm sure I just need to sit back and be patient and supportive and let her do her work. Maybe I need to figure out subjects I'm not ready to talk about yet. I still do most of the talking and I'm tired of that. You're right JL - I just need to sit back and listen. Thing of it is, if I'm hearing fog, it's very hurtful. There are things she said during the affair that were so hurtful and I still tried to glean truth from them. She said sex was mediocre. Now she says it’s amazing. I understand that this was through the lens of the affair, but does SHE? She has directly opposed some of those things now. Those things will stick with me forever. Maybe I'm still getting some pretty tainted information. I don't know.

Yeah, it's fog talk. Don't listen to her yet.

I personally think that WS's get a psychological high from the A that belies all reality. Kind of like heroin or LSD. It just makes you throw reason out even if it is staring you in the face.

fwiw, she seems really dedicated to making this work.

Thanks Cat,

She read my post right away and we talked about it a bit. She does seem dedicated, and I think is really headed in the right direction. I thanked her for working so hard, she thanked me for letting her. We're getting along famously, and most of the time it doesn't even take much effort for me. Her humble attitude and her attention to our marriage and to me go a LONG way to making me want to hang in there. It's so starkly different than the previous weeks and months, even the month long FR. Last few days have been very good really. In fact there has been only a hiccup or two during this recovery attempt. I'm seeing introspection from her that I don't think I've ever seen in our entire 10 years.

One of the things I struggle with is juxtaposing the things said to me during the A, with things said and done pre and post A. There often is no actual correlation. I can remember saying to Flick when I got the "I havent loved you for years" rot was "5 months ago you carved (his initals) loves (my initals) into a slab of wood which I still have a pic of. Where you lying then?" He said no, so I asked him if he was physco becuase those 2 sentances didnt match. He was never able to answer.

The reality is they create a whole new persona for the BS to justify what they are doing, and while there is still fog, that persona is occasionally dragged up. Also Coho has only been NC for such a short time. I am sure you have heard about how contact resets the withdrawl clock to zero? In case you don't really buy into it, we saw the PQ about a month ago and while not crashing back into full foggyness, Flick certainly got a mild case of waywarditis for a few days, fortunatly not terminal

You may never be able to understand why, what and how regarding the gaslighting, I am not sure how important it is at this very very early stage. What you need to most concentrate on is the basics. Fill each others EN's, avoid LBing, strive for 15 hours UA, practise RH, POJA, EP and extrordinary care for each other.

Yeah, I ask these questions, I read these posts and I KNOW I shouldn't at this point. It's so hard not to. We're doing a pretty good job with the day to day living and care for each other. Have much to learn before we delve into the whys I think. I have a call to Dr. Harley in the morning.

I do know how it feels

Its great your able to counsel with the harley's, we couldnt because of time issues, but we seem to manage. I think in SAA Dr H mentions that not everything gets sorted for a long long time.

We have a saying in NZ, 'it all comes out in the wash'

Yeah, we have that saying too... Came to mind when I was doing laundry a minute ago and realized we put a disposable diaper through the wash... Yuck!

It's funny the difference a week and a half makes. Last time I was ready to call Dr. Harley I was going to ask if he had any reasons why I shouldn't divorce. Now the focus is my role in recovery. My first call to him was about getting Coho on board with the recovery process, lest I get frustrated and leave her behind. For the moment she's on board and doing well. I have periods of hope and happiness that have been pretty much absent for months. During the affair I was happy if I could get my stomach to stop churning for a few hours, or even a day!

Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww


Oh yeah, I SO remember that. Good riddence

Time, time, time, time, time.
Sucks but the answer is time.
Answer is still time even when time has happened.
I have time written all over the house
I still want it to hurry up

Yeah, I look forward to 3, 4, 5 years from now when this isn't dominating our life anymore. I look forward to a time when I can just look at my wife and say, "God, that seems like another lifetime. Now I'm happy."

Interesting side note, Lildoggie, my brother just told me that he and my father were discussing a fly fishing trip to NZ this winter for us... Very excited!

Sounds chilly, bring your best rubber waders and beanies.

Oh wait, your winter or my winter?

Our winter! April/March here...

wait uh, it'd be April/March there too... sorry.

well there is that 23 hour time diff thing so briefly we are in april while your still in march.....