Do you mean with one of Dr. Harley's children, Steve Harley or Dr. Jennifer Chalmers?

I've sent my request through the link
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi7020_sched.html

I understand it's about the phone session with Steve H.

That is exactly what exposure is for! I am heartened by your attitude. Thank goodness she will get good support, too.

Is your wife Maggie? I rather hoped so because she sounds like she is in a great deal of pain and deserves a truly remorseful H.


Honestly your posts don't sound 'foggy' at all. When people still cling to the A, they sound very strange and deluded and are making all sorts of 'but, but' excuses. You sound very focused on winning your wife back.

The true test of fogginess to me is the reaction to exposure. Exposure usually means the A can never be, so the foggy WH's don't like it and make all sorts of noise about how terrible and 'vindictive' it is. You welcome it, so I don't think there is much of a withdrawal problem. Once you are with your wife it will improve further. Your main problem is you need to prove this to your wife.



What an excellent description of an A. You really do not sound foggy!





If OW is this close you REALLY need to move. Also if your wife returned and accidentally ran into her that would be massively traumatic for her.



Exactly. This will also become more evident to her the more action you take.



Mane, she probably feels like she was run over by a bus. Most BW's don't eat or sleep very well, though I'm hoping now her parents know they will be keeping a watchful eye on her.

I doubt she is in any shape to lead you by the hand and help you design a plan to prove yourself. You will have to take the lead. Unless she expressly forbids it, I would get as close to her side as possible. As soon as you can for as long as you can. You only have actions like these in which to prove yourself.

Even if your marriage was 100 pc healthy it wouldn't survive a 2mo separation. There is too much of a toll taken by separation.

Given that she very likely has an old admirer hanging over her pain like a vulture, (ALL BW's have at least one vulture. They can smell blood) I don't see how your protective instincts aren't straining at the leash.



This is an excellent idea.

Indeed she is.. she used the nickname she had when we first met in 2002..

Thanks for the encouraging comments. This also gives me an additional way to focus.

What about support for her from your f&f?

After exposing my h's A, his family all reached out to me with their support. It cleared up a lot of the pain for me.

They said they loved me, I was their daughter and that they would be hard on him because they felt I was the best thing for him. This was extraordinary balm for a shattered BW's confidence. It's important they do not pressure her to forgive you or to recover, because that's up to her. However if they tell her she has their support no matter what; but that they want to see you behave impressively too, that will surely mean a lot.

It is a way of proving yourself more trustworthy if you have encouraged people to hold you accountable.

My elder sister and brother and their families are willing to be with her all the way through and, yes, they do hold me accountable and are waiting to see me do incredible things now.

You are doing a great job, mane!

Thanks for the feedback, ML, I really appreciate it.

Now, as hard as I'm trying to do everything that needs to be done right and keep the pace, I still encounter the greatest hostility from my wife. Not only is she hostile, but she boils up with anger and nervousness so quickly almost everytime we talk (and by the way we don't talk that much either), that it is so difficult to accomplish a discussion.
Add the fact that I'm not that great at talking about personal feelings and you get a pretty nasty recipe.
She seems not to care about what I try to tell her, even the simplest things, like what I'm doing in that particular moment, not to mention the reaction I get when I ask her to tell me something about herself, instead.
How do I establish some constructive communication? I'm really uncomfortable, cause it seems she is erecting a wall between us.

Today I proposed to join her and the children at least for some days which I could try to take off from work, but she does not want me to be there. Actually she literally does not want to see me. Even the idea of quitting my job altogether and move together closer to home, did not inspire her much of a positive reaction, yet.

I'm really stuck. She is stuck, too, probably, but in the opposite corner.

I do miss her and feel the need to be together to slowly start working things out, but I also wonder how can I do things she does not consider, or even want me to do? And the fact that communication is difficult is defeating the Policy of Joint Agreement, isn't it?

How do we get un-stuck? There must be something I'm getting wrong here..

In advice you get from posters on how to proceed, some people may use the phrase 'Plan A her'. It is not a correct term for your situation, as it is a technique used by the BS to entice the WS out of an active affair. Or for a neglected spouse to prime the Lovebank in a bid to motivate his/partner. It's not technically applicable here.

However you may want to review the concept, as it is partially useful to you. Essentially it just means 'meet their needs without expectations'. You don't lose patience, or expect anything, you just gently offer. You back off when requested, but you remain available for help and support. Offering is really all you can do when your spouse is unwilling.

Offering has more power than is immediately obvious to you. It makes LB deposits.

Essentially she has free will and her requests must be respected. If you offer something that shows she is important, you've met an EN and put credit in the lovebank even if she does not take you up on it.

It may help you to remember that LB deposits are involuntary. They go in whether they are consciously accepted or not.

Offering transparency met an O&H need - you were open and honest even if she didn't check up on you.
Offering to go home and be with her met an affection need - she knows this offer stands even now.

You are making LB deposits and you are building trust. I don't like the fact you are separated one bit as it is so risky, but you are making progress.

She has to choose, but to do that you first have to make her a good offer.

Hi Mane

What you need to understand is...your BW is struggling with a host of emotions right now...and she did not ask for any of it. You can not expect a woman whose life you just nuked to be responsive with much concern for you or the marriage at the moment. Dday was just a couple weeks ago. You will have to learn to be patient and expect nothing of your BW for quite awhile. She is not stuck...you are expecting too much.

Great post Indie.

You also need to accept the fact that she is totally within her rights to divorce you and shut you out of her life. She would be doing nothing wrong in doing so. Her behavior toward you is deserved, and you need to accept that this is completely your fault. IF your wife chooses to recover your marriage, there are things you can do, but if she chooses not to, then it is game over. That result is an occupational hazard of adultery.

x2

mane:

While your intention and plan to reconcile your marriage is admirable, I don't think you quite understand what your wife is going through. She is on the emotional roller coaster, caused by discovery of your affair. What you have done is the most painful thing you could ever do to her.

She is very likely in shock. Shock is the body's method of protecting us from extreme pain. As she comes out of the shock, she will experience the terrible hurt, and may even become searingly angry with you. Her mind will constantly go over the facts of your marriage, examining the truth of your secret second life, looking for the lies.

She will be missing sleep and not eating. She will be functioning at a very low productivity level, if at all. She will experience crying jags.

She may feel ill at the sight of you.

Someone in this state will not be able to make rational decisions, or carry on life as she did before D-Day.

This is not to say recovery is not possible. But you are dealing with a victim of extreme trauma right now. Just be very gentle with her. Continue to communicate your plan to restore your marriage, and the changes you are making. Continue to be apologetic. Show her the depth of your love with actions. But don't expect any positive response from her any time soon.

You can do this, mane. You have made your choice..... you want to reconcile.... and your wife has the right to make her choice, too.

Your most observant and poignant word in that entire post is the word, "YET".

Your mantra: I will have no expectations, and i will continue to make Love Bank deposits, while not committing any Love Busters.

Repeat Daily.

She has every right to not consider reconciling the marriage with someone who broke her trust in the most insidious fashion.

All you can do is Stay The Course.

LTL

Thanks all for the explanations and suggestions..

The fact is sometimes I tend to get a little overexcited about showing my efforts to my wife and when our conversations end up in tears we both feel miserable.

The daily mantra "I will have no expectations, and i will continue to make Love Bank deposits, while not committing any Love Busters" is the way to go.

I just want to double check one thing: by hostile do you mean uncooperative or could it be characterised as an Angry Outburst?

Many of us here, (very especially myself!) were guilty of AO's before finding MB.

That doesn't make it OK though. You should not tolerate any verbal abuse. Quickly end the conversation if it ever gets to that point as it is unlikely to go anywhere good. We also don't expect you to be a voluntary punchbag.

If she's just stonewalling you and not showing much interest that is different however. She is under no obligation to give you any encouragement.

Questions about herself get 'a reaction' ? Perhaps if you could give us an example of a question which got a bad reaction we can coach you with a better approach..?

This too: the rollercoaster is hard to describe to someone who has never been betrayed. The extremes are hard for the BS to understand themselves. One day you loathe your WS and cannot consider ever forgiving, the next all you want is them to heal you, the third day is just a blank, heavy day and every movement is covered is lead.

It is probably a mix of the two. Let's say, 50+% of our phone calls end up or even start with AO's. In the remaining part, my wife usually cries a lot, while I try to comfort her telling about my EPs, what I'm thinking to do next.
About the stonewalling behavior, maybe is just the feeling I get when I try to propose something (e.g. few days vacation / her considering to come back here while I settle things about my job / me moving out of here ASAP) and the answer is that she's not ready yet to consider it.

E.g. when I try to deviate a bit from the heavy subjects and try to ask what has she been doing that day, how are kids, etc.. but then again, once we are in the middle of an AO, then probably nothing really works to divert the mind and relax..

Sometimes I'm afraid to call and ask myself how is it going to be when she picks up the phone. I just do not want to feel this way and I wish I could always have the right reaction and approach to face her emotions...

Have you read this?
Recovery After an Affair