Absolutely correct. I have never bought into the "we can still be friends" horses4!+. I think that despite my rather easygoing demeanor (at least that's what people tell me), I have a hard side. And I need it now.


I can't move, since I'm currently under water in my house. But she's moved -- at least 30 miles away. I don't know how long that can last, as she can't "move in" with OM...

But I have resolve. I'm a quick learner, and you folks have taught me that there's a very real possibility she may never return. That's my mind set, and will be unless and until she contacts me -- as specified in the Plan B letter -- to let me know she wants to consider coming back, she is now dead to me.


Jon & Sue's story is what prompted me to buy the book (I happened upon it before I joined up here). It's sitting right next to me. I've gone through a full pad of "sticky notes" marking the places I need to read. I felt that if you changed the names and some of the places (and that WW and I have no kids together), their story was our story!


Thank you, Barnboy. And thanks to everyone (if I named you all, I'd make this already-long post interminable. I know it's not over, so I will be lurking here, sharing my ongoing experience, and hoping I can help other who come here as I did: hurt, confused, helpless and in pain. Pay it forward, as they say...

It was supposed to be a humorous, snarky jibe at her stupidity in thinking you'd go on being some kind of "buddy" after she dumped you. At least I got the snark part!

tl

Understood (I too, am a former smoker). That she gave it up years ago, and now has returned to it is just proof that she's in relapse. "This is a tough time for me," just doesn't cut it.

Sadly, I had to make a point of that. Instead of getting tough and facing problems, she took the easy way out.

"This is a tough time for me" is a way of victimizing herself and justifying whatever she is doing, smoking, messing around with the OM, etc.

It's a copout.

Yep.

She tried to turn everything around and paint me as the bad guy. It's hard not to buy into her logic, at times. Which is what makes it so hard to resist engaging in verbal warfare. Her affair had "nothing to do" with her feelings about us. Yeah, right.

As of 5:00 p.m. today, she's out of my life. This is the way I've stated it:
The big question in my mind now is: If she ever decides she wants back, do I want her back?

That is entirely up to you.

Just to complete this very long and draining day (did I thank everyone for being my "silent audience" as I was posting events during the course of the day?), let me add a comment my attorney (who is the third party I've designated as our communications go-between) wrote me a few moments ago (I made sure Plan B did not violate the Agreement WW and I signed):

Your attorney sounds wise enough on this issue.

Isn't it amazing? Who would have thought an attorney could be wise {{{ducking!}}}

What's even more amazing is that I replied I agreed with her, and that it was a top condition for reconciliation.

---You did very well and from someone who doesn't know you at all Fred, you are my hero. You handled yourself excellently overall!



I said that what I'd written was that as long as she was involved with OM I wanted nothing to do with her. She insists that she would leave the marriage, affair or no.

The attack that gets to me and hurts me the most is her insistence that she would leave the marriage A or no A. She makes a very convincing argument.

---They all say that. As Steve Harley told me, she is simply trying to shatter your love. She in fact gets "hurt" by your advances because she has to accept the pain she is causing you and so she acts disgusted and says what will drive you away to get you to stop making her feel like the monster she is being. Ironically by being further a monster...inhumane.

But she still has an affect on me.

---Thus Plan B or you will go insane. Even seeing her number or an e-mail will cause you such illness... It got so bad for me that I felt like vommiting and once went over to my guy friend and just [censored] hugged him for like two minutes and walked away. He is a good friend but that kind of attention startled him, yet if I hadn't done that I felt like jumping off a roof.

I slipped. She asked my friend for some privacy and I let him leave my office. She once again said I'd made Plan B letter all about OM. I insisted I made it about myself. How many times did I mention him in it? Three times. See?

---Basically chanced negating the entire time your ally was there. She could have simply screamed clutching her face and fallen to the ground and your friend would have had to simply recount what he heard... Even though I Tsk, tsk you here, I'M SO GLAD YOU BROUGHT A FRIEND! HUZZAH!


She asked me if she could continue receiving her mail here. I said no. She asked if I would put gas in her car. I said no. She's currently on the phone. With OM? Probably...

---She was trying to see if she could make the Letter useless right away... Don't give in at any point short of what you WANT. Don't ever answer anything she says or asks...even if she is crying. Mine did that already a couple times just before the divorce. Such as "why do I want her to be misserable?!" As she took my Wicked and Blue October tickets and saw them with other people...about 200 dollars worth just for my half.

It's very tough not telling her the things I've learned over the past few weeks. I even lied and told her my sponsor suggested having a third person here (well, maybe you folks have become my "marriage/affair sponsors"). Maybe I should let him off the hook and say my attorney suggested it?

----You did well here... Don't talk about MB until she's accepted your requirements for reconcilation.


That's part of the point of Plan B: a dose of reality. You won't be her friend. You won't be her lover. You won't be her ANYTHING unless she commits wholly and solely to you.

---Looks like you've done a lot right Fred. Far more so than I did. If I had a second go back then I'd have at least a .20% (Note the . ) better chance!


The big question in my mind now is: If she ever decides she wants back, do I want her back?

--- All this you have done is for two reason. First one was to save your marriage. The second one was to fight for it so much that when the door closes you can feel good about it because you've both certified your excellent character and drained your love bank so that the separation is...as natural as it can be. Steve Harley's general words to me.


---Keep posting here as you go. Even to vent and be childish or anything. We all quite simply understand.

Fred,

Yes, my WW did indeed "disappear" and frankly she did so well before her affair-marriage, which occurred hot on the heels of POSOM's 3rd divorce (within days--as is so often the case). Starting in fall '06 (9 months prior to our D and 3 months prior to her EVEN FILING) she utterly "disappeared". She ceased virtually all contact with me and completely cut off the close mutual friends and family we shared (my family was the only "real family" she ever had). She hasn't spoken to ANY of these people in the 3 years since, despite them all having been intimate and loving fixtures in her life for over a decade. She can't face them! Despite her wistful nostalgia about them to me a few times since ("I think of XXX and XXX every day...", "they probably don't think much of me, do they?"), she can't face her own guilt and shame enough to call or see them even though she has expressed a desire to do so. She has utterly ISOLATED herself from all the people who really cared about her. NONE of these people ever got an apology, explanation, or even so much as a "goodbye" from her...not even a letter or an email...NOTHING.

This is not the behavior of a "normal" person, not even a "normal" wayward...this is the conduct of an insecure, immature, emotionally-retarded, and highly dysfunctional person. Someone who, years later, cannot bring themselves to ever "say sorry" or admit any fault (even as reciprocation), is and always was a cowardly and damaged individual.

The personality disorder(s) involved make their affairs "the mother of all infidelities". Even if these people don't affair-marry, even if the affair ends, and even if they do "come back" to the BS, these people are a long, long way away from true "recovery material".

MHO

Agreed. Marriage to a person with a personality dieorder is incredibly painful and disorienting. I suggest, if you suspect your spouse has one of these or if you are just completely bewildered and anxiety ridden as the result of their treatment, you start researching, get therapy, and consider getting out. These folks are nothing like the vast majority of remorseful waywards we see here. They are a different breed, entirely.

A last post for the day. It's been an emotionally draining day and I'm empty. I fortified myself by meeting with a sponsee, calling my (Al-Anon) sponsor, going to a meeting and treating my loving daughter and faithful "third party" friend to dinner!

My daughter thinks I'm absolutely nuts if I even consider reconciliation. I told her I have six months to consider it, and it's quite possible WW won't.

For the rest of the night, and for tomorrow at least, a new life for me begins. I'm starting the rebuilding and recovery process RIGHT NOW.

My daughter, along with some of my friends both old and new (Zelmo, are you there?) think I'm much better off. I feel a sense of truth in that, although I feel a bit ashamed to feel that way. In the five weeks since my world came crashing down, I have solidified my finances, made tentative travel plans, done some preliminary home redecorating, and am trying to move forward.

My Al-Anon sponsor said to me tonight, "I know what I'm seeing on the outside, but what's going on with Fred on the inside?" The truth is, I'm not sure. She told me, "You are going to have thoughts about her from time to time. That's to be expected. Just remember, that when you do, you also have to pray for her, and you have to pray for God to take it from you. You're not in control."

Right now I'm drained and I'm tired (maybe I'll finally sleep tonight). In the morning, it will be a new month and a new world. I'll have to check in here and see how much you all have changed!

I have a very strong sense that no matter how bad it gets for WW, she won't "lower" herself to coming back. I think I may have only one more time I will see her intentionally: When she has the moving van pull up in the driveway to take away the rest of her stuff.

Her appearance, behavior and overall demeanor today was completely alien (I'd heard that analogy used here; now I know exactly what is meant). I couldn't help but comment that "when the going gets tough, the tough don't start smoking." I suspect that no matter how far down she goes, even when she hits bottom, she'll think she can do it all on her own.

Looking back on her history, I can see how she has managed the "tough things" in life: She runs away. As one of our mutual friends told me, "until she gets honest with herself, she's never going to find what she's looking for."

I'm incredibly sad. But I have this little feeling in the back of my head (that I try to keep hidden) that I have somehow "escaped" something dreadful intact.

Time will tell.

I hope that in the oncoming days, I can give back a little of what has been so freely and openly given to me. I did the unnatural thing (for me) and reached out for help. And help was given. And received. My gratitude to you people, who I have never met, and didn't even know existed a few days ago, knows no bounds.

I'm still feeling the pain. But marvelously, for the first time in weeks, I feel a little healing coming on.

Thank you all for that.

Fred, you are about 4 years behind me. Once you are out, gradually, the veil of fog starts to lift and you see how much better off you are. You have to fight through the blow to the ego, as it is hard to be rejected by someone who is much less evolved.
But, this is the very reason she rejects and runs. She is just more comfortble with someone more base and undeveloped as your recovery and obvious smarts are a constant reminder to her that she is messed up.
It's sad,as I know you did not lord this over her. But, just having the qualities you do caused her to resent you.
Fred, my XW looks like something out of a Victoria's Secret catalogue. But, I was never lonlier in my life than I was with her.
After we divorced , I started seeing a woman who, on the outside, did not approach the arbitrary, superficial image that society seems to think constitutes beauty. But, she was so smart, funny and loving that I could not believe the difference in how relaxed and happy I felt with her. This is the type of person you deserve.

Friends and family kept quiet for years with me, Fred.Once the infidelity was disclosed, the dam burst and folks let me know what they had observed throughout the years. everyone, including my XW's parents , told me to run and never look back.

Do you think you might have been better off if they let you know what they observed at the time they observed it?

I really believe that a lot of the wickedness that happens in this world continues to happen simply because people don't speak up when the time is right, but instead wait until they believe that what they have to say would involve them in the least amount of conflict.

How are you doing this morning Fred? Sleep well I hope?

Good morning, Monc. I did sleep. I'm dealing with a back problem, so I took a couple of Ibuprofen PM before hitting the sack, so the combination of exhaustion and the antihistamine allowed me to sleep fairly well. I woke once, about 5:30, but managed to catch another couple of hours and I'm feeling rested now.

Last night my daughter wondered what WW had taken with her. I said I hadn't bothered to check. I made a cursory survey last night and I know I'll be coming across things as I begin the clean-up process of moving her things all to a back bedroom.

I already noticed she took her running medals (everyone who finishes a marathon or half-marathon receives a finishers medal) but left the chargers for her camera (which she took) and her bluetooth headset.

I can't get the image of her smoking out of my head. I wonder if that's going to be the last memory of her I have? If so, letting go isn't going to be that tough.

I'm glad to hear you got some rest. It can be hard sometimes just after it all.

I'm kinda inclusively laughing at the smoking thing, because when I moved my stuff from the home I noticed my WW had stocked up on cocoapebbles, KIX, and other candy crap. The fridge was even worse with like four tubs of icecream(One a full Gallon). lol All of which made me go WTF because she had never eaten like that since we got engauged because she understood those things contributed to an unhealthy lifestyle. Yet, there they were.

If there is a next time she moves stuff, you have a right to hover and question what she takes. You don't want her taking valuables now because you probably won't get them back in court without spending 200 bucks an hour in mediation. I should have thought about that the other day as a suggestion. To late I guess. Even packing for her to ensure that happens and you can maintain your Plan B, if you must given the way she acted this time. Yea, actually I really suggest packing for her because you won't be there to ensure she doesn't rob you blind. She's the WW after all and as much as we BS's want to believe there is a nice equality thinking person living in that alien husk, there isn't.

I'm sorry you're going through this Fred, it's never deserved by all those left behind.