Here you go.
Resentment Type A and Type B
Using Resentment as a Form of Punishment

OK, here come the dreams!!! Now, I can't even get away from the A when I sleep. I'm now dreaming of them together. REALLY??? Has this happened to anyone else? I haven't told WW about the dreams because I dont want to keep throwing the A back up at her.

Is there a checklist anywhere of what people go through with this stuff? When my MIL died, the nurse gave us a list of what to expect during the last 12-24 hours. As things progressed we knew she was close and we made sure eveeryone was there. That list was pretty accurate let me tell you.

I know we go through the grieving process but can anyone tell me that roughly at 3 months you get dreams, 4months anger, 5 months peace.... SOMETHING PLEASE

Yes. Dreams may come and go for the next year.
They do not get worse over time.

Timeline?
Expect a surge of anger/resentment somewhere around 6-8 months after the A has stopped.

Had a long conversation with W last night regarding the Giver, Taker and past behaviors from both of us. I'm in the middle of reading Love Busters and Dr. H's description of abuse is interesting. You (I) have to read that over several times before it sinks in that we've been abusive to each other for 20 years.

It started off with small stuff, I was in school full time and working a PT job and she worked 1 FT job and 1 PT job to help make ends meet until I graduated. During this time, neither of us wanted to clean the bathroom. Go figure. Instead of working that out, it morphed into a once a month angry cleaning where one of us would cave in and just clean it. Everything else was nice-nice so we let that slide and look where we are today...

Everyone tells you that communication is the most important thing in a marriage, but nobody tells you what needs to be communicated or how to do it (except Dr H so far). Love Busters and HNHN should be required reading in every pre-marital counselling effort.

We both realized last night that this has been going on so long that neither of us wants to be the one to put his/her Taker to rest and meet the others needs without expectations because we dont want to keep getting hurt. We're both afraid that the other wont join in and meet our needs.

It's not at a stalemate yet, we are afterall taking openly about this for the first time. It's a matter of giving a little and waiting to see what the other will do. Is this normal?

Also, I had a bit of a revelation last night. Over the years, I have told her specific things that I needed. Like, I needed to know that I was the most important man in her life (she has father issues like most of us). I was so explicit with her that I only needed to hear her say those words to me once in a while. She's never really said it though. Last night, when we were talking about our needs, I told her how overwhelmed I felt at all of the work that needed to be done to get the house ready to sell. I was overwhelmed because I felt as though I would be doing all of the work without any help from her (looking back at it, this may have been a DJ but this has happened on EVERY other project that I have done so I have reason to believe this). I told her that, what I needed most was, her reassurance that she was there with me to help with everything. Again, she wouldn't say it. When i asked why she counldn't reassure me, she didn't have an answer.

Later, when I was almost asleep, she said that she realizes the she was more important to her than I was and that was why she couldn't say those things. We talked about her Taker having total control over her and she said she'd think about that.

Oh yeah, we had sex the other night for the first time since D-Day. Very difficult for me with all of the images of her and POSOM going through my head. Not sure how often I can do that yet...

Make love with your eyes wide open and 100% of the time focused on her face. Do not look away. Do not close your eyes. Psst ....Tell her ahead of time that you are going to try this so she does not think you have gone coo-coo. What will happen is that you will have an intense emotional response to your wife, not to your inner thoughts. An intense EMOTIONAL response to her .... get it?

Ask your wife to do this with you.


You can thank me later.

How are they doing?

Pep,

DS19 asked me the other day how I was doing. Thats pretty big because he's the most distant with me. We talked for a short while and he asked if I should talk to our pastor about the dreams, images etc. He also asked about medication for any depression. I told him that I dont think meds are the right way to go yet and that I am talking to the pastor about it.

DS17 and I are restoring his 87 Jeep Wrangler. The frame rails are rotted and we're cuttint them out to weld in a new repair kit. He's learning a ton and we're having a great time working together. His grades are up (made the honor roll) and he's excited about Prom in May and graduation in June.

DS12 just had surgery on his leg that he broke skiing last Dec. They removed the hardware and he's healing very nicely. His grades are back up after a short difficult period in school.

Overall, they are doing well. I dont want to fool them into thinking everything is like new again but I dont want to dwell on the pain either. I'm not sure how often they should be told of our progress...

They witness the progress.
You can't fool them.
You and their mother are writing their family history as they watch/listen/sense.

Sounds like you're making progress. I agree with you about the abuse definition by Dr. H. It's an eye opener. Hopefully you make a full recovery

Still dealing with the very short nights. I've been up at 3:00-4:00 am most nights. very tired...

In a few days it will be 4 months from D-Day. We are definitly talking more openly and honestly and I actually heard an "I'm proud of you..." this weekend. The only thing is it had almost no impact on me. It was for something really small (in my view) and seemed fake. I could have used it over the years with some of the really big things that I've done but whatever...

Finances are getting better. D-Day +1 I went to the bank and separated everything. In out counselling sessions she has had conflicting arguements over finances. At one point she said that she just wants to be told what the budget is and doesn't want to be part of the budget decision making and later she said that she doesn't feel like she's treated as an equal partner when it comes to finances. LOL, I decided to pay attention to the first one and set up a budget on my own. I gave her certain bills to pay and left her with about $200/month to save (she's never been a saver). With all of that, I have been able to put a large chunk of money away to finish getting the house ready to sell and pay off other existing debt.

I realize that this is a marathon and not a sprint. I read thru my entire thread this morning and laughed a little at my attempts to do things my own way. Anyone reading this should take heed and listen to the vets explicitly. Things could have gone a bit easier on me if I had done that.

Lastly, I was hoping that I would start to feel some of the spark returning by now. While we're both trying to meet each others needs, I feel almost nothing emotionally toward her. I'm hoping the feelings of romantic love start to return but in the midst of the dreams and waking up so early I'm not so sure.

I did that as well. It's funny how you read through your own post and see how much you have changed. My attempts were downright silly. Keep it up Wow. Remember things like triggers and romantic take time. They say it will be fake at first but will become mor natural again with time. Rooting for your marital recovery from the sidelines! Are you both getting 15-20 hours of UA time in?

We have a lot of time together but it isn't all UA. Not much TV lately but family stuff, church stuff, etc.

When I was just starting to recover, it was without MB. I had to blaze my own trail and make numerous mistakes.

Aren't you the lucky dog? You know about the "love bank". Applying Dr. H's love bank concept, I imagine you are allowing only certain coins to enter your love bank. You are a lot like I was - back in the day. Analytical to the point of doing a thorough inspection of every love deposit, making sure it is legitimate and not a counterfeit.
You inspect every last red cent.

Early recovery is very slow-going with a decidedly analytical BS. You are not going to let just any old love deposit go into your bank. I get it. Recently (in real life) I've had the occasion to make some rather large deposits into our savings account. The bank puts a substantial "hold" on the money, releasing the funds a little at a time. That's you, The Bank of Wow777.

Hang in there 777. Allowing love bank deposits will make your journey less arduous than mine.

You both need to set down and set up UA time. I'm no expert and you are in actual recovery and I'm not. Reading the forum threads and the main theme is UA, UA, UA.

A bunch of non-UA time will not make up for a lack of UA time. You can't trade 2 UA hours for 4 or 10 FC hours.

To really feel the spark again, you've got to shake things up and start dating, frequently. Move heaven and earth to make this happen.

(I second Pep's comment about being analytical with each love bank deposit. It does take time.)

I have a suggestion:

Since it sounds like both of you are motivated to work on your marriage, sit down together every evening and listen to an hour of Marriage Builders radio together.

If you find it enjoyable, I believe you can count it as UA time (I don't know if Dr. Harley would agree with this or not, but in the past it has definitely been UA time for us!) Plus, it will be like having constant feedback and training from Dr. Harley. You will hear him harp on some things that are very important. You will be repeatedly exposed to a lot of the changed ideas that you need in order to make a marriage work.

And put everything else on the back burner until it happens.
UA is key. And not just a little here, and a little there.

How many hours of UA are you getting each week? You should know. If you don't, start now and track it. It's essential that you get the hours in. There's a big difference between 12 hours a week, 15 hours a week, and 25 hours a week. A BIG difference.

Other commitments can wait until you've got this one figured out.

We are getting around 3 hours a day on average. The last week or so has been a little less because of some other stuff popping up.

For instance, my son and I love to work on cars together. he bought a 1987 Jeep Wrangler that needs quite a bit of work and we've been heads down on some stuff that was keeping it off the road. We spent the last few days cutting rotted frame rails out and welding new ones in. He learned a lot and we got a lot closer through it.

It turns out, my wife came out just to hang out with us for a while (not UA time again but still good). She mentioned later that she loved seeing us working together and told me, again, how proud she was of us getting that done. I made sure to tell her this morning how much it meant to me that she was proud of me because one of her EN's is hearing about the stuff thats going well, not just the stuff that needs work.

Sunday after church is usually a day that we reserve for us/family. This past Sunday we had a community meal after the service. Even though we were together, it wasn't really UA time. It did allow us to serve others together again, which we have missed since leaving the fire dept. We both love to do that and I have had some resentment towards her for making us have to stop doing that. This helped fill that void some too.

So, even though we haven't had the full 20-25 hours this past week, we've still been making some good LB deposits in the non-UA time.

Correction, Sunday should be for family time, church and you and your wife scheduling your UA time using the POJA. The allure of the affair especially when kids are involved IMO is the UA time. Waywards have free childcare using the BS you need to show her that you can have alone time and a family as well. You need to show her you care about meeting that need for UA IC and recreation with just her. Show her that her affair wasn't reality and she can have the best of both worlds. This should be a team thing as you both want the marriage. Don't know if this was asked but would she be willing to post? I'm sure some FWW could be an immense help to her. Oh, if she does do not read her threads.

I've encouraged her to come here and read/post. I cant control her participation in the recovery any more than I can control her openness & honesty. She hasn't told me wheter she reads or not and she hasn't posted yet. Maybe she'll read this and be encouraged :-)