Just a question to those who have been in a long term dark Plan B or did a Plan B and D'd.

Did you ever feel that you didn't get closure, and that you needed it?

Since the trial, for some reason I feel the need for some sort of closure. I don't know what that looks like exactly, but I feel that there is something missing for me. It almost feels like I need to sit down with WH and discuss this in detail, find out why it happened, his thoughts etc.

Why all of the sudden?

Has anyone else gone through this? Did you act on it? Should we act on it?

It's like you just can't let go......UGH

Chai,

I don't know that I have the answer, but do understand. When I went in to Plan B it was like I was saying "you don't get it... you need to make a choice between OW and me". Of course I also felt (and still do) that I am the obvious better choice. However, my WH continues to choose OW, so we're still in Plan B. You went to Plan D. When the divorce is final it's like you finally got your answer. He's really not choosing you. Ouch... what does THAT do to our self worth? I think you got "closure", but don't know why it didn't go your way wish it didn't have to be this way.

Take comfort in the fact that your marriage did not end for a lack of trying on your part. That's what Plan A and Plan B before Plan D are for. You are a woman who stayed committed to your husband for 36 years. You loved him even when he did not love you. YOU are not the part of the marriage that broke. If you got his thoughts I suspect they would all be about HIM, and have very little to do with YOU.

You are valuable in God's eyes... even if in not in your WH's. Take comfort in that and look at today as the first day of a new chapter in your life.

Chai, I think this is like asking why an addict "chooses" his/her drug over a loving familiy. I feel like that is what happened in my case. I have had a very hard time with this because we did have a very good marriage/relationship for some 10/12 years before he got his first hit of his drug (corporate-sized attention with free girls and massive attention from girls) and none of us mattered anymore after that.

Even though he was the one who moved out and he was the one who filed and the divorce was final in January 2009, I have stayed in what I think of as deepest, darkest Plan B. Everything through the divorce was handled through the lawyers. I never spoke to him once, not in person, by phone, by email, nothing.

I stay in "Plan B" because he is NEVER going to rub his girlfriends in my face ever again and he is NEVER going to rub his filthy divorce in my face. We are NEVER going to be "friends". As is often said here, I do not need a "friend" who lies to me and ignores me and destroys his own family rather than give up his lying, cheating lifestyle.

If you haven't already, please drop in on the thread "The Fantasy of Divorce." That pretty well sums up how a lot of feel about "closure" after divorce.
Mulan

P.S. Neese, I sometimes wonder how much of a WS dumping a marriage has to do with plain old spite. It's like a child saying, "You can't tell me what to do!" It's like if they did choose you, *they'd be admitting they were wrong about their OP* and some people just can't do that. That's why they so viciously blame their BS for everything. It's as total lack of responsibility for their own actions.

But this makes them "happy," right?

Yeah, I think the only way I would get closure and still have gone thru a divorce is if WH said "yes now I do remember we had a great M at one time, I loved you with all my heart and I screwed up big time...leaving you for OW was the biggest mistake I ever made in my life and I will always regret it"

And I know that will never happen....or maybe when WH is 90 and alone....IDK I really feel that is the only way for me to have a Divorce with closure...so I have to accept somehow that WH will never except resposibility, will always blame me, will always think our M was a miserable sham and the worst mistake of his life. And I dont know if I will ever be able to do that.

Oh, absolutely!

After I received the final divorce papers. There was relief for me, not closure. I was relieved from the anxiety and the pressure of the divorce proceedings themselves - it really had very little to do with WxH.

For me, I don't think full, complete, closure will ever come. WxH was a HUGE part of my life for many years and is the father of my children. We will always have a connection and a page or two in my book of life.

There are still times when I feel like I need answers regarding the A. I have come to understand that even if he gave me answers, they would not be good enough. No matter what he said - it would not be acceptable as there is no excuse for not protecting the ones you loved the most.

I still believe (naively maybe) that WxH will apologize and THAT is what I feel I need to let go a little more. I just need the confirmation that he KNOWS it was wrong. I guess I'm really looking for him to confirm that I DID know him during the M - because what he stole from me was my whole concept of who I thought we were. He took 16 years of my life and told me I'd been living a lie.......

Maybe I just want to know they weren't.

I already know this in my own mind (after much work) now I'm at a point that I want to hear it from him for a little bit of closure.

What do I want this too look like? I want to be able to FEEL it from him, not just hear it (or read it in a damn email). I want us to be alone together with no distractions, I want him to take my hands in his, look me in the eye, and feel the words. This doesn't have to be word for word but you'll get the gist, "I am so sorry for hurting you and not protecting you and our daughters the way I should have. I am so sorry for turning on you when you were doing everything you could to try to save our Marriage. I am so sorry that I let someone as insignificant as babs come between us. You loved me, supported me, cared for me, made me laugh, bore our incredible daughters and did all those things for them. You did not deserve what I did to you. I promise to never hurt you again. I will move mountains to repair my relationship with our daughters. I am so sorry I hurt them, too. I regret what I did to you. babs was the biggest mistake of my life."

Probably very much what every BS wants to hear. It doesn't mean I would ever get into another relationship with him but it would go far in what I think of him as a human being and father.

He may not be able to save US with this but he sure could save DD16 and DD15.

Can I move on and have a happy, fullfilling, and joyous life without closure? Absolutely, and I will.

Your thoughts are not out of line, Chai. You were married for such a very long time. There have been many a moment where I thought "if we could just sit down and be honest with each other." but we can't, because HE can't. He's still in it and I would believe nothing that he said. I don't think you could ever do this until he acknowledges it was wrong. Otherwise, it will only hurt you more. He isn't ready for it yet.


For me, I can't let it completely go, because I feel that if I do I am condoning it all. It was wrong and my soul wars at accepting it is okay, KWIM?

Fox

Divorce does not give you any kind of answer about who he is choosing - it is simply a progression in the disease of infidelity.

People in affairs are in a fantasy, I don't think the gravity of divorce registers with some of them.

Chai, I think your husband fights you so hard because he is fighting himself so hard in order to justify to himself that all of this is okay. He KNOWS it is not, so must make collosal moves to prove to himself that it IS. And then it makes it worse...... he has to keep "one upping" .......

I hope this helps - it is certainly only my perspective....

Also I dont think there will ever be closure with me because there was never a chance for us to try and fix what was wrong...I will always feel I just wasnt worth the effort to WH...He just left and never told me how unhappy he really was...

If we tried to fix what was wrong and both me and WH just decided it wasnt gonna work out and then he found OW, maybe it woulda still hurt but at least I would know we had a chance to try, closure... but I had no say in the M ending, no chance to fix anything, no chance to stop loving him before he decided he was done and found someone else without even telling me...I was cheated on and lied to for two years...

I meant so little to WH that he just didnt even care about how what he was doing was going to affect me or DS...

Still, I completely understand what you are saying. I struggled with feeling worthless for quite awhile. There are times that I still do.

Here's another way to look at it:

You deserved more than he was able to give. Yes, it may have looked like he was just not WILLING to give, but maybe it's more that they couldn't.

WxH's OW has pretty low standards, I think, on what she requires of him in comparison to what I needed/wanted from him. I expect more from a man of mine, she's okay with a liar and a cheater.....

YOU are not the worthless one, still. I would never want to be them.

That is a good way of looking at it, WH ( huh, WH..wildhorses, WH..wayward husband) well i mean WH, wildhorses....

I mean you do have to lower your standards to be with a married man for two years and only see him once or twice a week for SF...and now WH wont take DS around her and he still only sees her about 1 or 2 times a week...

Thanks for your kind words, Wildhorses..I can always count on an MBer for those...

I know!! I didn't realize until after I registered this name that I would be "WH". YUCK!!! Some call me "wild", some call me "wildhorses", others call me "Fox." Take your pick, just PLEASE don't call me "WH" !

I originally came here as foxnhound - I was NOT the hound, BTW. I thought WxH may have found me so I switched my user name, but I still sign off posts to people that would remember me as "Fox."


Exactly. How would that make YOU feel? I'd feel pretty darn used - and certainly not at the top of his priorities.

He gave you much more than that - and you deserved much more than that.

She isn't more important to him, just easier to use.

Fox

I like Fox....thanks Fox.

Great posts. "Great" in that what you're saying is what I'm feeling. And I'm going through the D as we speak.

WH acknowledges that he made "a mistake." Hummm... "a mistake" in my book means that you subtracted an entry wrong in your check book or you misread a recipe and used salt instead of sugar.

But a 2 year affair, moving in with OW and her kids, taking every dime from our credit lines, ignoring our kids, etc., etc., is much, much more than "a mistake."

Closure for me will never come, even after the D is final, until he cleans up the consequences of his "mistake." Make it right financially, make it right with the kids, make it right with me.

Wildhorses -- the words you wrote above about WH apologizing brought tears to my eyes. We all want to hear that they feel badly for ignoring the effects of their choices on us. But even if WH spoke those words exactly, I would not feel "closure" until OW was completely out of his life.

Babs, Bimbo, PP... yep, they all have low standards. But our WHs continuing to keep these women in their lives keeps the book open. And them continuing their damaging behaviors (alcohol, drugs, gambling, prostitutes, name your poison) keeps the book open as well.

Even if WH were to die, as long as OW was still around AND WH was continuing his selfish behavior AND WH hadn't repaired relationships, there would be no closure for me.

Can we move forward? Absolutely. But WH and the A will always be a scar we can't erase.

Personally, when WH left last Christmas, I developed a large cyst on my shin. It turned into a staph infection the size of an egg. Gross... but it left a noticable scar that will never go away. The affair and the D will be like that... a scar that will never go away. The wound will heal but the scar is permanent.

I agree HH, it is a lifelong wound that may heal over but the scar will always be there....esp. cuz i have my DS that looks exactly like WH and I will always in some way have to have WH in my life even after we divorce...I hate that...

There is no closure, only acceptance that the marriage is over.

When my divorce was final, that was all it was, the divorce is final. There are still squabbles between me and my XWW, but they are fewer.

But there is no closure, nor do I expect closure.

I simply try to be the best dad to my child when I'm given the chance to do so. That's all I can control. That's all I can influence.

Agree with Enlightened. Closure that I got came from acceptance.

There is still work to do from the D, dragging of feet, etc., but I no longer need some sort of closure.

I will let you in on some info I have become privvy to from my dad. He was talking to the Z one day recently, and said to him "there is no way, EVER, that SL is coming back to you, to be with you, EVER!". Apparently, the Z's response was one of bewilderment, disbelief. They just don't get it. His head is firmly lodged in his nether regions, fo sho. You can't get closure FROM a person such as this. You have to find it from your own moving on, from gaining understanding that YOU were never the issue, YOU had nothing to do with the infidelity or the choice to leave. YOU are not the cause of the waywards anger. They are. They just don't get it.

Yeah, when my MIL says to WH, if you wait until BS (me) divorces you, thats it its too late and WH said people get back together all the time after D just cuz we get D doesnt mean we wont get back together 10 years from now...HUH!!!??? FAT CHANCE!

But I think my WH just said it to appease MIL not because he ever would think about getting back with me...who knows? maybe they really are that dumb.

Well, I hope Chai doesn't mind me taking this thread a bit off topic...

Stillhere, it's actually not unheard of that people who D remarry. It happens, but I'm going to take a leap and assume that is happens for those who finally extract their heads from their rumps and get it together, become a person worthy of their ex and SHOW that they are good people again. Also, the love has to still be there.

I have no love left for my ex. He has continued to show me that he is not the one for me, and is still very wayward in how he chooses to live.

Totally agree. It just takes us injured BSs a little while to get that we were never the issue. We can come more quickly to this realization during the D process when we uncover the depths of their lies... debt, gambling, alcohol, protitutes, drugs, etc... whatever mixed with the A led to them wanting out.

Yeah, I think my WH will always be an a$$face.

Chai

I would also feel the way you do - want closure. I read a book that may help: "The Dance of Connection" and there is a chapter there that helped me in the past when I was on the brink of leaving my husband because of his hurtful passive-aggressive abuse to me.

The chapter is: "An Apology? Don't Hold your Breath".

It was truly enlightening to finally understand how a person gets to the point where they can apologize and be accountable. At one point the author states: "People who commit serious harm can't be reached through conversations that further shame or blame them..... we need to understand that people can't be more honest with us than they are with themselves....... The other persons's willingness to own up to harmful deeds has nothing to do with how much he/she does or doesn't love you. Rather, the capacity to take repsonsibility and feel remorse is related to how much self-love and self-respect that person has available to draw on".(The Wrongdoer May Never Accept Responsibility). "....So don't speak because you need an apology or validation. Rather speak to focus on what you want to say about yourself, for yourself. Longing for a geniun apology or an affirming response is totally understandible, but unrealistic when you enter a conversation with someone who has betrayed you. The only reason to speak is because you need to speak. If you decide to open up any painful and loaded issue, let go of any expectations of getting the repsone you want".

I really like this book. You should read it (also read The Dance of Anger). When I remind myself that a person's capacity to take responsibility for their hurtful behaviour is directly related to "the strength of their spine" :-) I feel better. Just keep reminding yourself that.