Kiss you better get back together with RQ since NG have up all of his new year resolutions for you.
(interestingly he chose to give up on the few things he can control like diet and exercise and focus on something he can't control - the actions of others)

...give up on the few things he can control like diet and exercise and focus on something he can't control...

Do you see now the amazing power of words and nuance? JK's note could have said:

...give up on the few things that would selfishly benefit himself like diet and exercise and focus on something to altruistically benefit members of the community of humanity (Empire State chapter)...
One implies I'm Darth Vader, and one, Luke Skywalker:

BTW, Kiss: Last evening bride and I attended a 5:00pm Albany Devils AHL game at the Times Union Center. It was "Kids Get in Free Night"! Might be a useful thing to keep in mind for reasonable family entertainment.

Speaking of entertainment.
Check out your local YMCA for family and children events.
Much of it is low cost or free

NeverGuessed,

I have been continuing to work on meeting RQ EN's. She tells me that I am doing a good job but she keeps having triggers. Somedays worse then others. I comfort her when she has them but I feel helpless.
We were talking the other night about how close we are and how things are the best that they have ever been but its the damn flashbacks. I'm tired of telling her that they will go away with time as long as we keep working on us. I wish I could take away her pain.

Any advise? I feel like a broken record.

KISS

The triggers are going to happen. Keep doing what you have been doing -- comfort her.

That is really all you can do. Over time the triggers will gradually lessen.

My advice to you would be to "bury" her in new, wonderful memories so that the image that mention of "Kiss" will bring will be, "...he brought me flowers today.....he helped me around the house this week....he called me driving to/from work....he helped the kids with their homework..."

And until they all disappear, your only task each time one strikes is to remind her, "It's the past...it cannot happen again....we have a great future with our family together...I'm sorry...."

Constancy, consistency, and consideration will be your allies, my friend.

Thanks for the feedback that is exactly what I have been doing. It is exactly what Steve Harley told me on one of our sessions. I just feel like I need to due more. I don't want her to feel like I'm just repeating some line that I have been rehearsing.

We are now headed out to the Diner for cake and coffee. Some "alone so we can talk and escape the crazy demanding little ones" time.

KISS

It is exactly what Steve Harley told me on one of our sessions.

Well, then, his agreeing with me shows him to be a very bright fella!

NeverGuessed,

Well played!!

KISS

Steve Harley, The Good Doctor Harley and NG!! The Three Wise Men.

Steve Harley, The Good Doctor Harley and NG!! The Three Wise Men.

Bride just opined that more precisely it was two of The Three Wise Men, and one of the stable's asses.

(Where in the list of top male ENs does it include her keeping him grounded?)

Kiss, how is the UA time plan for next week coming?
Are you and RQ attending to each other?
How are her "triggers" doing?

We ain't going away out here, my friend.

NeverGuessed,

We have to sit down today to make our schedule for the week. I lucked out today as they scheduled me off. RQ is off due to it being MLK day today. So we are spending the day together. We are going to take the kids roller skating. Not my thing but the kids can due what they want and have fun. This will also give us alone time to talk and I can hold her hand.

RQ did complain to me a couple of days ago about me doing to much around the house. I need to do less when she is home and pay attention to her. Not that I don't but its not consistent. I always maintain putting RQ first. Her total happiness continues to be my #1 goal.

She hasn't said anything about her triggers in the past week. I don't know if they are better or she just isn't telling me! Is that something I should be asking her about or will me asking make them more consistent and take longer to go away?

KISS

She hasn't said anything about her triggers in the past week...Is that something I should be asking her about...

NO! YOU NEVER BRING UP THE A OR ITS EFFECTS!

RQ has been around here long enough to know that any triggers she has, if she cannot dismiss them immediately herself, she has leave to ask you for support and consolation without being specific as to the cause. (If not, we'll take her back to "Remedial MB".)

As long as you're attentive and sensitive to her moods, you are doing what you should be doing.

Glad to see things are going well. Don't be a stranger!

kiss,

How much UA time are you getting?

What are you doing to meet RQ's top EN?

How are things?

I'll second that.

How's life treating you? Doing ok?

This have been good. One issue this week though. RQ's mother wanted to take her to Cancun for her 40th birthday. (They had been talking about it for a year and my step daughter was going with them also). She asked me a couple weeks back how I felt about it. I told her I wasn't thrilled but it was up to her if she wanted to go. I told her that I wouldn't be happy if she went on her birthday. She said that that was the plan. I said that I wouldn't go on vacation without her and that I would like to be with her for her 40th birthday. She said she would tell her mother.

So probably about Tuesday or Wednesday my step daughter asks her what dates they are going. RQ tells her May 4TH through the 11th. Her birthday is the 8th. I had no idea or heads up. So I asked her about being away for her birthday and she says that her mother just bought the tickets. She said she didn't want to tell me because she "knew I would not be happy". "RED FLAG MAYBE" So I was pissed.

We didn't talk the rest of the night. I stayed on the couch that night. I talked small talk in the morning and during the day when I was at work I text her to let her know that I love her. We also talked a little. I was keeping away from the trip thing because I didn't want to fight. I was waiting to be able to talk and it not blow up.

So that night I brought it up and it was not good. I told her that I was very hurt that what I said or my in put did not matter she said that she did it because she "wanted to go". Later on I found out that she never told her mother anything we talked about her not being gone on her birthday. So its obvious that what I thought didn't mean SH** to her. (I had no want or need to be close to her at all it was a real crappy feeling and I didn't like it. Huge flash back to how things used to be before the A)
I hadn't had those feelings toward her in a long time.

The next day we talked and she said that she would tell her mother that she wouldn't go. So now I feel that either way I lose because I will now be the bad guy.

So later she tells me she told her mom that she isn't going to go. The reason she tells her that she can't go"""" drum roll please *****because I don't want her to go!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That adds so much gas to an already large fire and rocky relationship. I AM NOW THE BAD GUY!!! I REALLY WISH I NEVER SAID ANYTHING!! I SHOULD HAVE KEPT IT TO MY SELF LIKE I ALWAYS HAVE!! I love her so much but I have always had issues about telling her how "I" feel about things.

I have been trying to not think about this situation and just move on but I feel that their will be repercussions for me saying how I feel. I know that one of the biggest opportunities in our marriage has always been communication and talking about our feeling but I'm not sure if this was the time. I was just disappointed that she would want to go on a vacation alone and especially her not caring about being together on her 40th birthday.

I did go and buy flowers for her yesterday and have them for her when she got home from the city. She went down to see a Broadway play in NYC with her sister in law.

Disappointed and confused,

KISS

KISS

Good for you for telling her. But you MUST try to see it from her POV. This is a milestone birthday and she had a wonderful oppty to celebrate it. Perhaps she also thought of it as a way to make a fresh start and move on from a horrible year. Of course she's disappointed and resentful. She'd be superhuman if she wasn't!!

There is still too much focus on "me". You need to get cracking on how to make this bday as special as possible. Stop the pity party!

GET MOVING!!!

I disagree with this.

If my H wanted to spend any birthday, let alone a "milestone birthday" with anyone but me I'd be ANGRY and PISSED and hurt. It does not make any difference that the wayward and betrayed positions are reversed in my imaginary scenario (he, the FWS, would be wanting to go; for Kiss and RQ it is the BS who wants to go).

Kiss has not long finished being involved with another woman, and rather than being indifferent to what RQ does on a special birthday, he is jealous about spending time with her. RQ's "wonderful opportunity" for a holiday needs to be an opportunity for her and Kiss to be together, not for her to be away with her mother and daughter.

Apart from honesty and openness, the one thing that a BW wants more than anything is proof that her H does not love OW still, and that he never lost his feelings for his wife. Even better is that those feelings are stronger and deeper in the light of nearly having lost her (me). It is agony to think about what OW meant to him.

Here is Kiss expressing a desire for his wife to spend a special occasion with him, and not to go away and leave him. That could be interpreted as an expression of the love the BW wishes her H still felt. Instead his disappointment is being interpreted as a "pity party". I'm a bit shocked at that.

I'm with SugarCane.

My WH spend every major celebration during his A days not with me. My birthday, Valentine's, nearly missed Christmas. He even had a dirty weekend date with the Dolly instead of joining me for our wedding anniversary, even after I told hi. How very important it was to me. Now I would be horribly offended if he has ANY reason not to spend special days with me.

So KISS, make this one a really special day for the two of you!!