Just filled in Steve H's questionaires, roll on next thursday

Sorry missed this post before but I'll reply now. As far as domestic support, I was hoping she would have cleared this up herself as she is very fair even when angry.

Ive ALWAYS since we first lived together 9 years ago had a huge part to play domestically, in fact most wives were gelous I would work full shift and still do majority of housework. My wife suffered with Cronic Fatigue courtesy of PCOS (polycycstic ovary Syndrome) badly for first 6 years of M so I was largely in charge of the house which I was fine with.

Last year or so shes improved a lot and we shared the housework evenly upto this period.

Obviously this hasnt been possible to maintain recently as shes been sick for a couple of weeks and so I had full care of kids, still had full time job to do and as she was sick she was very emotional. There was NO physical way I could maintain my level of input into the house.

Since we've found MB our family dynamics have changed a lot. I still manage daily housework but no more, as on here or working on M. This takes me longer to plan/execute as most as it takes me a while to 'get it' as you've all noticed (Hopefully this will become more natural as I move foward)

The only thing im not doing at the moment is getting more than 0-4 hours sleep for past 8 days. Ive asked wife to support ME more domestically to allow me to continue with M commitment.

Ive never been disrespectful while talking to her, Im happy to look into her eyes

wahoo, postman just delivered SAA just in time for my weekend off, beautiful Finally something happened conviently lol

Do I have to wait for wife as I told her not to read it without me at any cost lol

See, the thing that worries me about this "oversight" is that this was the one that your wife seemed to be the most upset about in her very first post. I know you find it hard to accept that you put your manhood into a sewer pipe then infected your wife. It's disgusting, I agree. It's embarassing. But it should have been one of the first two or three things on your list. Some of the "I wasn't in touch enough" kind of items are inconsequential. You gave your wife an STD. It's foul, I know. But own it. You'll get over it sooner, I promise. My recovery may have been stalled because I don't think my own H "owned" the most egregious things from back then.

Hey yllan,

The pieces will keep slotting together. Sooner or later the penny will drop and you will be embarassed about these early posts - happens to all of us FWW.

I couldn't get close to my H after my A, part of it is admitting to yourself - your list is a good start.

Now with that list, think on how each of those items made your wife feel and write it down - practice some empathy, for each of those items try to imagine how you would have fely had it been the other way round.

TO do this you will need time alone with no distractions - and you will have to work hard to let your mind think these things. Do some relaxation breathing and then focus on the list.

Hope you make great strides over the w/e (I really think you can do it - FWIW)

The STD was the #2 thing on your wife's list of unacceptable behavior, yet it failed to make your list of what? 25 or 30 items? Hmmmmm.

W is working next two days and the monday I dont have any kids here either so should be a great day for me to spend QUALITY time on M, something I havent really had so far. The empathy side of things is very important for me to male progress on as this is still effecting everyday life, up to this morning.

Unfortuntely not good day today. Am off work this weekend and was expecting to spend lots of time with W, working together. This morning was taken up with house and kids and by the time we were free (1:30pm) I didnt really know what to do. Ive got plenty of ideas for ways to make progress on my own but not much we can do together.

Im desperate to start reading SAA tonight, but not sure wife is ready to commit, due to bad day. Shes out at the moment, so ill do something nice for when she returns, maybe a nice hot bath and hopefully she'll soften enough so we can start SAA.

Hope your all doing well

Your right but over the next couple of days ive finally got QUALITY time to invest. Im aware of my owned list and im making sure im aware of the other items that im not ready to own but working on them. I understand the moving on will be 10 times easier if I 'own' the issues.

Thanks for your imput

Did you and the W read over the weekend? how are things?

Yes we did thanks We havent got that far into SAA but its proving a good read. Its making us both think a lot and causing many thought provoking convosations. Im reading it to her in bed at night and usually I fall asleep VERY quickly but im reading this and talking for hours. Definately enjoying it, think shes getting fed up with me going on about it lol

I personally think things have improved a little. Im trying hard to offer her emotional support and control difficult situations better than before. Im working hard with the ideas from MB although I think if she sees another list shes going to freak lol

Think I will concentrate on DOING rather than LISTING lol I have enough to go on for now - Thanks for all assistance so far.

Thanks also for putting up with my earlier crap and sticking with us it means alot....

>DOING

TOUCHDOWN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good to hear you're working through SAA together. Keep hanging with it. Follow her lead on how much she wants to talk about stuff, though, as there may come times when she just gets to "shut-down" stage & needs a break.

Tip: You might want to edit your comment about "enjoying" any aspect of this just yet. (I'm not sure "enjoy" is quite the word your wife would use to describe things, as I'm sure you appreciate). There'll be things to enjoy about your recovery when you're a bit further along the road, be patient & you can get there.

I dunno, GO.


There IS a certain JOY in learning and applying and SEEING the Harley techniques IRL instead of on paper or screen.

Equally, there is a certain JOY in seeing your spouse respond to your applications with appreciation.

Fair points, Dealan. In my own experience, there's definitely been joy to be found in rediscovering one another & fixing what infidelity has very nearly destroyed, true enough. If his W is ready to call it enjoyable, then it's probably safe for yllanoitomE to use the term.

To be perfectly honest it was selfish 'enjoying', I guess after I had achieved so little over the previous year, and got to the point last week of almost loosing her again, now ive managed to find focus and an 'interested' in SAA and of course MB that I cant help but to 'enjoy' the moment.

My W has clearly become more relaxed as she sees things happening around her, but enjoying, no I wouldnt go that far. Although i'm making progress she still comments that I'm not directly meeting her daily EN, so I'll have to work on encorporating that a little better as well.

Thanks for checking in, always appreciate your inputs as thats what kickstarted these improvements

p.s. read more of SAA, again not a vast amount but its leading to us both having revelations and interesting chats along the way. Coaching on Thursday

Im so glad your sticking to it! stay with us here, don't give up on any of it, you'd be surprised how fast you, your W, the M will go "back" if you stop working on it, it goes "back" faster then it goes forward and sometimes its very discouraging when you think you've gotten one lump out of the carpet (from sweeping it under there) only to have it reappear

This is making much more comfortable reading. Doingfine has summed up the rate of progress, it needs to be kept on top of. As you will have seen from other posts - it is definitely ups and downs.

Keep up the good work!

Has your W done the emotional needs Questionnaire yet?

This sums up the situation perfectly. I have every intent of hanging around, I wouldnt cut of the people who helped me and wander blindly into the woods.....

It can be very discouraging, if you read her thread you'll see im genuinely trying to make progress for the M but she still feels unhappy about her EN's. I guess its easier to work from lists and tackle one thing at a time. Its very structured. However meeting her EN's in the mean time im finding very tough. Anyone know of a method to extend the day to maybe 30hours lol

Meeting her EN's isnt a simple job at all, Ive always struggled to come up with ideas and make them happen. I have to spend twice as long to come up with EN opposed to M progress so therefore there wont be any M progress, but she'll be happier (until she realises theres no M progress ) - NO WIN SITUATION

Finding it VERY hard to achieve both...... Guess practice makes perfect eh??? CHIN UP

Thanks for continuing to check in....

I DO have a ray of hope, Emo.

Your babies are still too little to leave with the eldest, but when he's old enough to babysit you both are gonna LOVE it!

This past year or so my dau has been sitting on her siblings (not literally), and our love banks are pert near to bursting.

It was really hard to get that 15 hours a week in before...and I suspect with how young your kids are, you two probably have the same problem. Is there any way your mom and dad could sit on the kids every once in awhile for you two? Getting that 15 hours a week goes a l-o-n-g way towards working on each other's ENs!

- Kimmy

I all to well understand the situation, yes time alone is difficult as most people would have adult time in evenings but thats when im at work!! We were only discussing the other day about what life would be life is say 3 years once all 4 kids at school and having 9am-2pm available EVERYDAY lol It scared us both lol it terms of what we would do, we're living our life as caged animals but when caged animals are released into the wild they cant deal with it. Same situation lol Silly i know but hey.

Trouble is we dont have 3 years, in this situation much longer with EN's not being met id give my wife 3 weeks before giving up

Kust finished my half of chat with Steve but not posting yet as wife still having her chat. Very insightful though.....