RidicSit - Most waywards get through the worst of the withdrawal in less than a month. But some don't, especially if the affair was longer.

My ex and his OW broke up just a week after our divorce was final, but he didn't really get through withdrawal for 7 months. I mean to where he regretted his affair, wished he'd never met the OW, and wanted to work on our relationship. By that time I was done.

Protect your love for him. This stuff (as you know) gets very tiring.

If I were you, I would call the Harleys for a plan. It only takes one call, and then you can follow their plan until hubby realizes what he has done. In the meantime you can be making a good life for you and your family and hopefully he will be ready to join you.

He's okay. He tries hard when he's around them, he just can't maintain a happy mood for long, so then he sorta shuts down.

I keep it so that they get to see each other, but not for too long, to balance what the kids see and need.

I think I do all right with that. Not perfect, but all right.

He gets really quiet, weird smile, just starts to look and sound forced and fake.

It's hard to describe, but you can tell it's not authentic.

I would bet a dollar he isn't taking meds. I'd even bet two dollars. Which? Since I don't bet? Is huge.

I have a long list of requirements. I don't think, in imy opinion, he can sustainably meet them at this point in time.

Ridic..

Very glad to see you back!

I think its a very good idea to take breaks both from MB's and from your husband.

You need to focus on yourself first and foremost -- to make sure you remain sane and healthy.

We were just saddling up the posse. Don't let it happen again.

Wayzilla did the exact same thing. Fake smile. Very annoying fake laugh.

DD would call her �the Actress.�

That's just what it looks like. It's weird.

Pretty good. I am getting pretty angry with him, though, and I absolutely yelled at him a couple of days ago. Which isn't so much what I do, as a general rule. But it scared him. He knocked it off ( he was complaining about team parenting, about how I wasn't including him- which wasn't what was happening).

I am trying to figure out what to listen to, from him, and what not to.

He has made much more of an effort to spend time with me. To try and date me, so to speak. I know there is zero contact with OW. And he's in his therapy. He is reconnecting with the friends he dropped to spend time with her. And he has stopped texting me anecdotes about her.

He says he loves me, and wants to be with me, but I need to understand he'll never get over her, though he loves me more than her.

That's a change from before. He also freely admits that their relationship wasn't rooted in reality. But that he's fixated on what he thought their relationship was, and how our relationship can't live up to that, and the therapist can never help him get over her.

The therapist apparently told him what I said, which is that she was outta there when she found out the truth of who he was as a peson, but I stayed. And that I still love him, which makes me very valuable to him.

He told me he is jealous of people he sees on the street who seem happy, because he knows he will never be able to be that happy.

All of this adds up to me thinking- no on coming home.

But not blacking him out as much as it was in plan B seems appropriate, too.

I am confused.

(((((RID))))

Oh Rid, I am sorry that I can offer you nothing more than that virtual hug and tell you that I am pulling for you.

Have you thought about calling the coaching center?

I plan on it, but I am not sure that I'm at a stage where it would be useful. I mean, I know the Harleys are always useful, but I am not sure that this is a point where they would be best utilized. I've read all the books and memorized this site. LOL! But my H has a copy of HNHN and SAA, and I don't know so much what he's read of them. His therapist said they were good and positive books to read for the situation, but the therapist is concerned, and rightly so, with getting him in a stable place.

I have a therapist. He has a therapist. He needs to be dealing with the underlying depression/personality disorder issue before I think it's appropriate, at this point, to work on our marriage much.

But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe the coaching center can help me in a way I'm not seeing. I am thinking right now, even though it's not my strong point, that I have to sit back and let time and his therapy work before I can do much for the marriage.

But I would appreciate any advice or other reads on this. Admittedly, I am tired.

I am only talking about the coaching session to be with you. That way you could discuss your sitch and they would be able to help you devise a plan and let you know when and if you should let your WH come home. I am saving up my pennies(can't use my LOONIES since they go straight into the pickle jar hehehehehe) for the day that WH says he would want to come home. I am confident that they would give me good advice on the direction and steps that I would take to ensure the best possible chance for a GREAT recovery. I have NEVER seen anyone say bad things about their experiences with the coaching center. Maybe they hypnotize everyone who calls. TeeHEEE

That's a very good point.

This sounds terrible, but I am very tired of making what feels like all the relationship decisions.

Having someone else give me an outline would be a relief.

I felt really strong when y'all guided me towards exposure, and no matter what else happens, I know that was absolutely the right thing to do.

Sorry...

Late to the fiasco, but Ridic... this is so funny. I hope you are doing well. I am still reading.

Wow Ridic, just finished your thread !!

You are awesome and a saint. The whole time reading (just started a few days ago) I was hoping that someone would mention the coaching center. I think you would really benefit from it if the advice there is anything like Bill and Joyce Harley do on the Radio program. They really do cut through all the drama and BS and help formulate a plan of action. If your H would listen, I'm sure they could shake some sense into him and maybe put to rest some of these delusional thoughts about OW.

I record the previous broadcasts overnight and put them on my ipod and listen.
MB Radio: http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi4200_radio.html

I just thought I'd update.

I know I am supposed to contact the Harleys for counseling, but I am already spending 300$ a week on individual counseling, and I feel like I should give that a chance before I do the Harleys. Or at least some forward movement.

I guess I'd just like some input on this situation. I am starting to feel like it's never going to get any better, and I feel as if I'm doing the wrong things. And I'm exhausted. And I'm actually starting to get very, very angry.

WH is still out of the house, mostly. I went away for a weekend, and he moved one box back in while I was gone, and he will spend some nights here, on the floor.I know that he shouldn't do that, but short of filing for a legal cause, I cannot force him out.

He has had absolutely no contact with OW. Other woman moved out of the apartment he had been paying for, and completely covered her tracks for him, as well as renewed the restraining order. She's serious as a heart attack about staying away from him.

He's completely depressed. We are three months past D-Day, and he is still absolutely wallowing. He no longer asks me to contact her and lie to her, he asks me to contact her and get her to tell him how much she hates him. Which of course, being a reasonable adult, I will not do.

He sleeps for long periods of time. He is horribly grouchy. My children now directly address him when he's out of control, which leads to him complaining that I don't defend him ( against a 10 year old? Srsly?), and that usually makes him go and hide away and sleep on a floor all day long. And no, I am not exagerrating one bit.

He tells me he will never be the same again. He cannot get over what he did, and his relationship with her. He is very angry with his doc for hammering home that the affair wasn't reality, and once it became real, she split as fast as possible.

He tells me he wants to be married to me, and take care of me, but that I cannot expect anything else from him, because he's a broken person, and I need to understand that.

My therapist tells me that I should consider filing for divorce.

His therapist tells him to grow up and stop feeling sorry for himself, and be a man.

In the meantime, I am getting angrier and angrier. I am responsible for everything with the kids. They are tired of him being inconsistent, and they do not trust him. They can read his moping, and want very far away from it.

I am having a lot of flashes about times that he's lied to me, and things that have happened. Because I don't get positive things from him, it's hard to let them go.

He was very angry a few weeks ago, because I went to a concert with a friend. I saw a band that he saw with her on a Tuesday, and then saw with me on a Wednesday and the following Sunday. He was very, very upset with me for going.

I just don't know what to do anymore. And I'm tired.

I don't know your whole sitch but it sounds like you are way overdue for Plan B. What do you think? ((RidicSit)))

Personally, I would end the individual counseling and go all in with the Marriage Builders counseling.


Give it 3 months of weekly counseling. If you're not seeing improvement -- go back to what you're doing.

Nothing to lose at this point, right?