Such great advice, CWMI, thank you. He is already starting to show signs of regretting what he said yesterday. I will keep you updated.

I agree this is your time to calmly change the pattern of this marriage, be firm that it has come to a point of change of you separate and go your own ways, you cannot live in a marriage like this any longer......
Make an appt with a lawyer figure out what your rights are. Let your husband know you are serious and if there aren't any changes coming that you will move forward.
Simply let him know that not only is he unhappy but you are too........
Tell him you love him and want to have a great marriage but he has to be willing to fill your needs as well for that to happen.........
You could sign up for the online course here to help put your marriage back together, with a good plan and working together it can work, a lot of marriages have survived from worse places.........
If he agrees to your suggestions, thank him and tell him for the first time in a long time you are hopeful for a happy marriage............
good luck.
jessi

Okay, so he has calmed down a bit but has basically given me an ultimatum which is to let him do whatever he wants with friends as often as he wants without protest and to trust him to do the right thing or we are done.

The truth is, he does have a reason to be unhappy. I have a long history of trying to SD and DJ him into submission. I have recently worked very hard on this and it is better, but now any slip up on my part seems to trigger intense negative emotions on his part.

I am probably more "controlling" than the average woman and even though I want to use the POJA, neither of us do it well. I try, he resists, then I SD and DJ and then he does whatever he wants plus some in order to put me in my place. When we do seem to get somewhere with it, like agree that he will come home at a certain time, he never sticks to our agreement and says he needs me to be flexible.

I am sad to admit that I pretty much complain EVERY time he spends time with friends without me. I am comfortable with him inviting friends to our house and staying out of their hair, but beyond that, I have serious trust issues. This might stem from the ex-girlfriend issue and also from the fact that a few times women have developed crushes/expressed interest in him but he did the right thing in those situations without my prompting. I guess I just want to prevent the situation from even getting that far and in my head, that means not going out without me. I can see how restrictive that could feel, though.

I do feel comfortable with him spending time with some of his married with kids friends, but it seems like those opportunities are rare and the opportunities to spend time with single people are much more frequent.

Reading Hilltopper's thread, I think there is a big UA issue going on for us. If we can get off of the divorce track for a bit, I am going to go out of my way to make sure our time together isn't only spent working in the yard, cleaning, and watching tv. That is primarily how we spend our time and it needs to change.

He has specifically said that he will not continue with this marriage if I keep referring to the MB approach because "there is no magic formula." I don't know what to do with that.

It also seems that if he wasn't so into IB, I probably wouldn't appear or desire to be so controlling. He claims that if I wasn't so controlling, he wouldn't desire to behave independently as often.

I have tried this but he says that I only think about me me me and it's time for both of us to think about him for a change.

Sorry but this would be a dealbreaker for me. At the very least I would only stay in the M if he will do coaching with Steve.

This is not the basis on which to build a marriage. He is telling you in no uncertain terms that he is a freeloader/renter and unwilling to become a buyer. More to follow...

Written by Pepperband:
A discussion about one of my favorite Harley books !!!!!


Buyers, Renters, and Freeloaders



















Please read the entire thread here:
http://forum.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2332882

Penni,

I don't want to hammer you but one other thing to take into consideration is that if your H had an EA and

never acknowledged it
never implemented Extraordinary Precautions
continues IB
refuses to POJA (rebuild romantic love with you)

he is VERY likely to have another affair. At the very least, your M is going to be miserable.

Look at this quote by Dr Harley:

LINK

Thanks, Susie, these are all really great points.

I wonder, though, even though I think I am attempting to POJA, is the fact that I have tried to veto almost all friend outings making it impossible for him to imagine a successful POJA? I really do shut a lot of things down in our marriage from how we spend our vacation time, how we spend money, and how we spend friend time. Maybe I am not really practicing the POJA as well as I think I am and that is part of the problem.

I have been thinking I cleaned up my side of the street but this event tells me there is more work to do. I guess I am just wondering if I should do that work and then revisit the idea of POJA, after he is happier.

I agree it is essential to marriage, I am just not sure if now is the time to insist that it happen.

Penni, I think you misunderstood me.

He recently told you that you do a good job meeting his needs and he doesn't care if you feel your needs aren't being met. He has just told you he is unwilling to change his IB, correct?

My point is not that you insist he POJA things with you but that he is a freeloader/renter and a freeloader/renter will NOT POJA even if you stop your lovebusters or do a great job with the UA time.

Is he willing to do anything? Has he admitted he needs to make some changes to make this M work? Will he coach with Steve?

Penni, I just went back and looked at your other threads because I have a funny feeling about your H but wanted to see what other info I could find before I commented further on it.

In one thread you are talking about an inappropriate relationship you feel your H is having with a woman at work, and that he has done this before with a woman at another workplace.

In another thread you mentioned that he spends a lot of time with his work group, drinking etc.

Penni, are you SURE he is not having an EA with one of these coworkers?

I think the problem for his is not my back of meeting needs but rather my LBs. Also, I don't think he sees me as a source for meeting RC as much as he sees friends as that source.

At this point, no, he doesn't feel like he needs to make changes and he definitely won't coach with Steve.

I have access to his email, facebook, and phone records and can account for his time away. We both have a GPS function on our phones that allows us to locate the phone and I have double-checked his location when he has been out. There is no evidence of an EA from any of those sources.

When he was telling me he wants a divorce, he did say that he wanted to get out before we had kids because he thinks that commits him for life. He also said that he is afraid his looks will decline in the next few years and if he needs to leave this marriage and start dating again, he needs to make the decision to do that now while he is still attractive. For the past few weeks, he has started working out a bunch. So, those are some possible red flags but like I said, I don't have any evidence of anything.

Penni, unless he is willing to coach w/Steve (and even then I just don't know if he will ever transition out of being a freeloader), I doubt there will be any changes in your M, even if you eliminate all of your lovebusters and even if you two start spending more UA time together.

Have you told him that you will BOTH need to make some changes? Because I think you need to be honest with him now rather than *hoping* if you try a little bit harder you can convince him of this later...

penni,
I don't like it that he says he doesn't care if your emotional needs are being met right now.......this isn't a recovery plan, I would approach him about you cleaning up your side of the street, but in no way could you live with being ignored that is what he will be doing.........
How is this plan good for the marriage and reconnecting........
It does sound like he might want to free up his time without you bothering him about it.......suspicious at little don't you think, wants time away, doesn't want to meet your needs............red flag.
I agree it's time to turn this marriage upside down and fix all the things that bother both of you, do you love him enough to change so he is happy?
Spending 15-20 hours a week together having fun and talking........
Don't love bust, fill each others needs......
Be honest and supportive.......
If he is willing to work at it together I would agree but not if it's a one sided decision.........
A marriage is two people not one person doing what they want, while the other is afraid and feeling badly and alone..........
Set up some extra ordinary precautions when it comes to interacting with members of the opposite sex.........no personal conversations with anyone other than you...........
think about what the two of you need............

Thank you, Jessi, another great response. I think he does care about meeting my needs to an extent, he just thinks I need more than I should need. It's not that he ignore me, it's just that I want more than what is currently happening. If we spent 15-20 hours per week together doing activities we both enjoy, I bet I would be pretty well satisfied. When we are together, we usually have fun. He is good at affection and conversation, it just doesn't happen enough right now.

Getting the EPs in place is another story. Since he doesn't admit that his communications with his ex were stepping over the line on his part (he states she was the one that was stepping over the line), he finds the idea of having to put EPs in place to be an insult. He was cheated on the by the ex I just referred to and said that living in fear was just too stressful and he wants to live believing that good people will do the right thing when married. He comes from a pretty story book, traditional family and I come from a messier family situation so for me, it isn't hard to believe that good people in the wrong situation do the wrong thing. I probably over-obsess about prevention and he doesn't think about it at all.

Penni,

what I would do is do some checking up on him and that work situation, going out with his co-workers, make sure there isn't something going on that shouldn't be...
this should set your mind at ease........
then I would work at filling his emotional needs, the ones he wants.......spend your 15-20 hours together with quality time, things you both like to do.
I think the more comfortable he feels with you the more he will meet your needs because he wants to make you happy........make him fall in love with you all over again............
He shouldn't look at setting up boundaries to protect your marriage as insulting, he should be looking at it like something he choses to do so he can protect what you two have and could lose.........
You both have to do what makes the other one feel safe........you have to show the love you feel for each other, you have to respect each other, you have to be honest, you have to take care of each other.......
You two need to rebuild a better connection, one where you make all your decisions for the marriage and each other........
A good plan to save this marriage is what is needed.........

Thank you, Jessi.

I am going to do some checking up about the work situation and see what turns up.

He has backed off from the idea of wanting a divorce and is open to discussion.

I think the need I could do a better job with for him is RC, which will help with our UA time as well. When we were dating we used to do a lot more stuff. Right now, I don't think he really views me as a good option for RC. I am going to focus on that right now, as well as making sure I am avoiding LBs.

We do need a plan for EPs, negotiating, and everything else. I will bring it up cautiously now and see how he responds. I will bring it up in more detail after he falls back in love.

Just thought I would post an update. The divorce talk has stopped.

I planned a weekend full of RC and we both had a glorious time. It was exactly what we needed. He has already started planning RC time for next weekend.

I reexplained the POJA now that I am clearer on what it looks like, and he said it sounds totally reasonable but of course, threw in an MB jab - that we don't need a website to know that it is the right thing to do. Okay, whatever. At least he listened and agreed it was a good idea. I also mentioned that I might send the MB website to a couple we were friends with who are now struggling with infidelity and he agreed it was a good idea. So, that is progress.

He also had the opportunity to have a drinking night out with work friends and he turned them down over text. They kept harassing him to join and he finally put an end to it by saying, "I really want to spend the evening with my lovely wife." He has never done that before - he usually tells a white lie like he is sick or his family is in town rather than saying he is choosing to spend time with me.

We have a ways to go but I feel like we are on the upswing.

One or two more good weeks with UA time and I will pitch the online program.

All good stuff, Penni! Don't sweat the MB jab - as long as he gets on board with the concepts it's mission accomplished.