I completely believe that the best way for us to heal is for me to show him I am capable of change, the problem I am having is with his recent decision to completely cut me off. For the past several weeks I have been driving to our home Friday and leaving after the weekend depending on his work schedule and I thought that was helping.
In BH had told me there was i chance of reconciliation I am scared and ashamed to think that I might have given up by now. Starting the very first day it was we can get counseling, then a call the next day saying counseling won't work. That was when I first had ideas of injury and as it happened, we were in a car accident with the uhaul when I went to go move out. Thankfully nobody was hurt but both BH and I thought the same thing, was this a sign I shouldn't be moving out or was it just 2 old people who couldn't drive. Ultimately he still wanted me to leave so I obliged. I had an obligation near there the following weekend so he offered to let me and my sister stay there the night before so I wouldn't have to make the 2 hour drive before dawn to get there in time. We arrived early and went to the movies, had a good time, discussed our issues, and were intimate. He was still unsure about if he wanted to work things out so I foolishly continued to hedge my bets and didnt officially end it with the AP even though since discovery I was so hurt that I hurt H that I didn't even want to look at AP, I was still emailing him. Worse, I lied to H when he asked if I was still talking to AP. things blew up all over and I made the firm decision to end it with the OM and have not had contact with him since that day.
I went to spend time with H the following weekend for nights and were intimate each one of them. We had painful discussions during the day where it was questioned whether or not he should continue to pursue this relationship but we went to bed in a good place each night.
Thanksgiving weekend we had planned to each spend it with our respective families and for me to come down Friday but starting early afternoon he kept sending me messages that didnt actually say that he wanted me to come that night but strongly hinted at it like "we've never been apart on thanksgiving, it's going to be really weird" and " you could come tonight if you wanted to" so I left my parents house at 9, went to pack a bag, and did the drive, arriving just before midnight. We were intimate Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. With one day of painful maybe we shouldn't becoming this conversation. Sunday he needed to go out of town for the week for work so I took him to the airport and went back.
The next weekend I was to pick him up from the airport so he gave me a key. He came home a day early so we were together Friday, Saturday, and Sunday night before I left on Monday, again intimate nights and an long uncomfortable discussion during the day. Next week was exactly the same except Wednesday he called and we had one of the should we be doing this conversations by phone but ultimately his decision was for me to come.
The next week had the same mid week conversation but the decision was to come
Christmas weekend was similar. I had planned on leaving after church Christmas Eve but he wanted me to stay the extra night so I did. I forgot to mention that for the previous 3 weekends I had slowly begun to move back items I could fit in my small car
Last weekend we had a hard discussion on the 30 th where he was ready to call it quits. The focus was not the affair but my traits such as selfishness, narcissism, unwillingness to take responsibility, and general lack of concern for those around me. He said the affair just highlighted these traits and that is not the type of person he wants i his life. This was the first night that we were together without being intimate
The next morning I asked if I should leave, telling him that I didn't want to begin the new year with him if I wasn't going to end it with him. The result was him saying he was committed to making the new year a fresh start for us. I went home Wednesday morning and Wednesday night he said he wanted me to start moving back and sent me anemail expressing his commitment to making our relationship thrive. Thursday he decided that he needed space and wanted to hault communication. Friday he engaged in small talk in the morning then sent an email with a link to this website saying to 'read this if you're bored' and stopped communication other than to send an email that said goodnight.

Is this roller coaster of indecision normal for a BS? How do I know which one i should believe? He has mentioned me not taking initiative in the relationship, how do I know when to push and when to be patient and give him space? How do I address my own emotions without being selfish? I know this is my fault and I shouldn't impose my pain upon him but it is getting to the point where it is starting to effect my health so I need to find some way to cope. I am scared that he will not have the strength to forgive both the affair and the terrible way I treated him for years before that and I am scared I will not have the strength to continue being rejected f he sticks to the decision that he doesn't want to work it out.

This might help.

This is a thread of a FWW and her BH. FWW lived about 2-3 hours away because the BH needed space.

After alot of hard work and endurance she is back in the same house with her BH.
BlackViolet's Thread

Fm I would like to second the advice you have been getting here. You are really getting great advice please listen to it.

I did and I know I was very very lucky that my husband not only forgave me for cheating but also reconciled with me and worked on our marriage together. I'm pretty sure I did not deserve it back then for the pain I inflicted on him and my whole family. Like your husband mine also wanted action not talk, and Fm, IT WILL TAKE ACTION!

If you are having self harm or dark thoughts please please go see your doctor today. Depression will affect your thinking and then your actions even if not self harm directed. I learnt the hard way so please don�t do that. GET HELP NOW!!! Don't think it will just go away or is not that bad, get it checked out! Think of it as just another task you need to do to show how serious you are on being a better you. Nip it in the bud right now.

I would like you to consider this from your first post here, its the first few words you typed -
�My husband sent me a link to this site today �.�
Fm your BH knows of this site, he's probably read a bit here and is probably waiting to see what you DO. In fact did he not spell it out? He NEEDS to see actions. That you may be a bit limited in that right now only means you need to stop making excuses and act on those things you can do.

Obviously I cannot speak for your BH, but perhaps he does not see your 'pets' in the same light as you do. You have obviously invested time and effort in breeding them, spending time with them, time he may feel was stolen from him. Emotion perhaps also given to them as a sole hobby or side business rather than just pets? Maybe he also considers you were willing to invest time and effort and emotion into breeding them and not the marriage and not children? Are there not reputable breeders or people you could sell or give them away to? At the very least you need to consider his feelings behind this issue.

Facebook, just get rid of it. No ifs or buts just do it. NOW.

The ups and downs of wanting and then not wanting to reconcile, the roller coaster ride is not that uncommon for a BH or BW. Part of it is a reflection of their emotional state and pain that your affair caused. Its normal for such a subnormal situation.

Fm get that PLAN up and running. Joining the coaching option, booking Dr H and his team for marriage counselling, ask for further advice in getting the plan up! Have it ALL ready and up to go and then as Mel and others have said, go to see your BH with the plan. From all that has been said on this forum DR H's team are very good at involving reluctant spouses into the MB program and quite frankly his reluctance may be tied to your inaction.

Fm my DH said to me you broke it so now go and get it fixed or just get. Of course it was always going to be more than just me and what he actually said we are not allowed to type here, but you get the meaning right?

We who have cheated NEED TO.... HAVE TO... do the first hard yards Fm so that our BH have some chance to see we just... JUST... may be worth a try at working on the M. It really is going to be on you and you alone to show this. MB can help a lot, but YOU need to do those things, take those actions to demonstrate you may be worthy of any further risk.

If you delay you are just saying to your BH its too much work I don't want to.

You have a chance, a opportunity, can't promise success in any form, but it would be a darn shame to see you throw it away because you dithered!

BH emailed me earlier and asked what my plan was, this was my response:

You asked what my plan was, I'm guessing you mean assuming you allow me the chance how will I work on making things right?
First I would need to move back. Depending on your preferences, we can either continue with the divorce or not, and if you wanted me to I could give (our renter) notice the day I move back so that if after 45 days you have decided I am incapable of change I can leave right away. I have mixed feelings about that because it does give us an easy out and I don't know if that will effect your decision but if It would make you more comfortable I would've happy to do it.
I think we should buy the two books they talk about on the website, his needs, her needs and surviving an affair, as well as the companion activity guide. We should read the books together and do the activities. Even before the books come, we should sit down and go through the website, take the emotional needs and love busters questionnaires on the website and discuss our answers. They also listed the top 10 emotional needs that are not being met and suggested we each order them from most to least important and discuss that so that we can learn how to best meet each others needs and not waste our efforts on misdirected attempts.
My plan requires me to commit to the policy of radical honesty and the policy of joint agreement and I will have to ask the same of you in return. We need to discuss anything and everything, positive or negative, in a safe and loving environment. If I am not treating your anyone appropriately, call meout on it but do so with love. If you are doing something that bothers me, I will let you know as well. If one of us is missing something, we need to let the other person be aware of it at once rather than letting it fester. We should also apply the policy of joint agreement in our lives, where we should not do anything that we cannot come to a solution which we are both enthusiastic about. This will take a lot of time and effort but it is worth it.
We will need to take the time each week to devote at least 15 hours of undivided attention. To each other to work on meeting each others emotional needs, they suggest taking half an hour each week to map out our schedule and plan for time together. They suggest doing some every day rather than trying to cram in an undivided attention weekend and I agree that daily care is what we need.
In addition to going through the marriage busters program, we should make it a top priority to attend church every week and spend some time afterwards getting to know the people there. I want to take the confirmation classes and would be greatful if you would share with me in that experience and help me through it. Since I made the commitment to you that I would take the classes, I have been praying about us. I am not sure if it is doing any good but I hope the classes will help me understand better and I know that a relationship based around God is crucial to you. I would also like to attend the pastors marriage workshop or if there won't be one for a while, have another meeting with him to discuss tools on how we can move forward and how I can work towards making amends and bringing God into our relationship.
I do not want to make vague promises like I will be nicer or I will do more for you because those are words that can be taken too many ways. I would like to think that you have been able to see a change in if not the results than at least the efforts put in over the last few weeks. It is my promise to you that it is not temporary because of a fight but it will be a permanent effort to improve myself and our relati on ship. I am not my any means perfect and I know I will need correcting from time to time but if you will give me a second chance I promise I will not waste it.
I am committed to proving that I will not hurt you again, not only in terrible way that I hurt you with the affair, but also in day to day things like being mindfully inconsiderate or disrespectful in public or in private.

Is the rollercoaster of indecision normal for a BS?


Yes.


Imagine that the person you loved and trusted the most gutted you completely, threw you innards on the floor, picked them up and handed them to you, blamed you for it happening, started to walk away, then turned around and asked to be loved and trusted again.


Being the victim of an affair is one of the most traumatic experiences one can ever suffer - and traumatic experiences are one thing that can outright change a person forever.


Take that into account. Your BH is going to protect himself from you, and he will do it without thinking about it, and he will do it for some time.

One analogy I have used to describe this is to imagine he is encased in a shell with small cracks, and you are throwing rice at him to provide nourishment. The BEST approach to making sure something makes it through the cracks is to throw large handfuls at the shell... throwing small amounts or single grains won't work. Large handfuls. And, a lot of those handfuls will simply run off the shell - you are concentrating on what gets through.


A lot of words will be wasted. Your actions have proven you to be a liar to him, and that you will drag lies out to protect yourself from consequences. You need action, and you need presence.

Action, time, consistency.

THAT is your plan.

Your "plan" is just a reiteration of marriage builders....but you have missed the main things needed to recover from an affair: No contact for life, extraordinary precautions, and just compensation. Your plan completely misses these things.

You've gotten such good advice here but haven't taken it...since your BH said he needs to see action, wouldn't it have been awesome if you said: I've permanently deleted my Facebook account, I've gotten rid of the pets and have a bag packed waiting for the moment you want to spend time with me, even if you're only willing to give me a day I would love to have any time I can with you because I treasure that gift. I've started liquidating my website business to pay for coaching with marriage builders and to be able to move back to our home area and I've started looking for a job in the area because I need to work on my people skills. I'm ready to go through LoveBusters and have filled out all the questionnaires for me and also for what I guess is your point of view, and I'm implementing changes. I've ordered all the books.


I hope you can see what a difference there is between your rambling list of things your H would need to do with/for you versus things you have done/are doing to better yourself?

And having read through your whole thread, one thing that popped out at me was when you mentioned spousal support. The idea that you would even TahINK of such a thing is totally repulsive.

My words may seem harsh jumping in late in the game (I just got back last night from a two day road trip), but you don't seem to be appreciating or incorporating the good advice you are getting, and pretty soon, you will lose the interest of the many veterans you have posting to you.

That response could've been read as open & heartfelt, or it could've been read as having a smart-assed ring to it. E-mail is difficult.

Fluffy, for over 24 hours, people have been telling you to drop the conditionality from your thinking.
Your thoughts & comments reek of it. "I'll do this if [such-&-such]... ... "assuming [such-&-such]...", etc.

Your attitude needs to be simply "I'll do this." Period.
No conditions, no qualifiers, no weasel-words, no rhetorical escape hatches.

You must have a plan of things you'll do come hell or high water -- regardless of whether or when he allows you a chance. Please realize that you need to be doing these things simply in order to give yourself a shot at getting that chance.

Through the third sleepless night in a row this is what I have accomplished. Facebook has been taken care of and Here is my list

I will protect my husband and his feelings above all else
I will agree to continue use of GPS on my phone so that my husband can track my location at any time
I will not discuss personal issues with members of the opposite sex
I will not have social interactions with male friends unless my husband is also there
I will continue a policy of no contact for life with AP and will immediately let my husband know if he does contact me
I agree to use the policy of joint agreement as the basis for all decisions
I will follow the principle of radical honesty with my husband at all times
I will set aside half an hour each week to discuss my schedule with my husband
I will immediately notify my husband if I need to go somewhere that is not on the schedule
I will provide login info and passwords to all accounts
I will go to bed at the same time as my husband every night and get out of bed with my husband every morning
I will make my phone, computer, and iPad available to my husband at any time
I will commit to at least 15 hours of undivided attention with my husband each week to meet each others emotional needs
I will find a loving way to discuss any issues I may have in our marriage and will encourage my husband to do the same
I will attend church regularly with my husband as a family. I will be the one accountable and not put that burden on him
I will answer all phone calls, tango or face time from my husband if at all possible and return them as soon as I am able if it is not possible
I will comply with any other request my husband has to make him feel more comfortable about my behavior

In addition to the list, I also took action towards something that he has stressed was important to him, I emailed the pastor at the church we have been attending the past few weeks about confirmation classes. I am awaiting a reply but hope that getting the ball rolling shows something.

TAKE ACTION don't focus on "if my BH sees this I will win him back" that makes the changes not genuine and look like a ploy to win him over. If it were me I would be worried if this was a long term or short term change. To remove that just do. Is your Facebook closed yet? Do you have a plan to love closer to home? Did you sell those pets? Did you write a list of EPs and put them on every mirror to remind you? Did you change your contact info? If the answer is no to any of these questions then your hedging bets and waffling hoping you can do minimal change to regain your BH's love. IT WON'T WORK!

I agree with GloveOil on your first sentence of response. If it were me, that's where I would have stopped reading. I have tried to read it differently like it was something full of care, but I just can't find it.

You say you can't talk with him and because of that your efforts may be in vain, yet you report here that he is communicating with you. He's told you some of the things that bother him and he's perhaps waiting to hear from you that you understand the MB principles and you have done this, this, and this because of your care for him, your care for your marriage, and your newly forming understanding. How do you think he will feel if you wrote him back and told him that you have gotten rid of the chinchillas and your FB account and it's because you understand the damage and lack of care that IB is and that you understand boundaries without conditions?

You need EP'S and boundaries WITHOUT conditions. You need to communicate the steps you've taken to do this without any hint of saying to your husband that the boundaries are in place contingent on his willingness to work with you in the future.

Not sure if I mentioned it above but since d day he has all passwords and gps on my phone

Answers to the above questions? I'm only being hard because I hope one day my WW comes here and gets the exact same advice! You say there's NC with OM? And you live close to him right?! It's only a matter of time before he is in your neighborhood knocking on your door.

Yesterday he sent me two emails which I responded to plus a goodnight, get some rest
With each email he sends I feel more hopeless.
Before goodnight, this was the last thing he said

You brought this upon yourself.. Upon me. You need to deal with it. I'm trying to move on with my life
I'm not trying to hurt you but this time brief time apart has showed me that you did not make me happy. I myself make me happy and that I am not dependent on you for my happiness like I believe you are.
Regardless how this turns out I appreciate the effort you are putting into this.

I asked him about both the idea of getting a hotel nearby and about giving the renters notice now but he did not like either of those ideas. Everyone here says I need to move back there and i completely agree but he's making it pretty clear that's not what he wants. He has said that he feels more comfortable when I am with my sister than when I am alone. (Because she can make sure I'm not doing anything I shouldn't) This is another situation where I am at a crossroads because the advice given to me by everyone here is the exact opposite of what he says he wants. One of his issues with me is that I think I know best and act on it regardless of his feelings. Would moving be another example of taking action not following the poja?

I understand you sent the e-mail of your plan to BH already, so what I'm putting here is only situational awareness for future consideration. There are some things that could have been improved.

The list of ep's is taped above my bed and next to my computer screen. The bathroom I use is shared with my sisters roommate and taping it to that mirror would be an imposition to her that would break the rules of my being here.
Facebook has been taken care of and I am listing the first round of chinchillas on Craigslist today once my sister and the roommate are up so it doesn't disturb them.
There is nc with the OM. BH was the last to speak with him and am not sure exactly what was said but there have not been any more attempts. If he does show up at the door my sister and I have discussed that she will ask him to leave and we will call the police if necessary.

Wait for the vets on that one. IMHO however I would move closer to BH. It would show that you aren't interested in OM at all. My WW POSOM lives in another state but if he was in close proximity to my WW I would be thinking they are together constantly. So flip flopping the living situation would put his mind at ease on that issue. Ahem, no plan on those questions I see. Soon vets and other posters will leave your thread alone unless you start making progress. Please if you have time read my whole thread and you will see the changes in my mental state and life based on the advice and Dr. H material made me a better person and father no matter what my WW did/does.

Having passwords to Facebook and other means of contact you use with OM isn't an EP (extraordinary precaution emphasis on extraordinary) close it and all other social media sites like twitter, google plus, etc. You are setting yourself up for another innocent affair. On the bright side your BH has not seen a lawyer so he hasn't started thinking divorce yet. He's on the fence and follow the advice here its your best chance to improve yourself and your marriage. Or you could waffle and send emails saying your changing when you haven't done any actions to back up those words. Good job! Have email address and telephone, cell phone numbers changed? Do you have any male friends if so get rid of them. Look at the list of EPs that was posted earlier on your thread. Post your EPs here as well so they can be edited by the posters

Never guessed
Would you please explain the reasoning behind why I should not have mentioned continuing with the divorce or asking the renter to leave? I understand the part about my mixed feelings but I though the other two were considering his feelings and giving him options to make him more comfortable. About a month ago when we were talking about me moving home he mentioned that the only way he would feel comfortable with it would be if we continued with the divorce while I was living there so he wouldn't feel like he had wasted time trying if it didn't work out. He also said that he felt like continuing the divorce would make me see the gravity of the situation and give me an incentive not to slip back into bad habits as soon as I move back in.

1) They were both details that added length and complexity to your letter, without compensating value. (Value in this case being assurances to your BH of the existence/possibility of the new you.) If one of his newly revealed complaints was your occasional impersonal attitude, laying out rental agreement changes, in this note, is not working in your favor.

2) You don't EVER mention divorce, at least not without being compelled.