I agree LG that you should follow Dr. Harley's advice about going into Plan B now. Dr. Harley specifically told you to not to talk to your WH and to enter Plan B.

LG,
I know some of this is so very difficult to take. You are just too close to the situation, and to emotionally invested in the situation to see how important this advice is. I hope that you can see that just in these last couple of pages of posts, you are making decisions based on your heart strings and fear. Look at it another way. This situation is calls for completely different skills than you have ever practiced in your marriage. You are at WAR. Please understand that. It may not "feel" right because you are not used to having to go against the grain. These "decisions in war" are none you are familiar with, so please just let your pre-conceived ideas go, let the ways you have always thought and coped go. Take on this war with the advice you are being given. You will see in time the wisdom behind it!!!

I am trying to catch up now, but I am amazed at the turn of events here on this thread. I heard your radio show and Dr Harley made it clear that you needed to Plan B and that you needed to focus on yourself and getting on your own two feet.

He even asked you for your feedback and you agreed with him wholeheartedly. From what I recall.

You know...every BS goes thru this. Plan B is change and it's scary and you don't want to let go. But consider what Dr Harley often says: Feelings will lead us astray. The ones who can resist doing what feels "good" or "easy" are the ones who truly recover...marriage or not.

Sure....you can shop around until you find someone to give you advice that you want to hear, but is that really what you want? I haven't heard any legitimate reasons for you to continue on in Plan A and to ignore Dr Harley's advice. So I have no idea why someone who advise you to do this. Can you tell us why this person/s is telling you to continue in Plan A?

I can tell you why. This "person" knows nothing about the dynamics at play here so it is easy to tell her what she wants to hear. After all, it is not THEIR ox getting gored so why do they care??

I don't see why you need to attack me as a person ML... you have no clue what I have been through in my life. No, I don't want to be in this situation. The reason we are here is because there was more hope in a job in this area than there was in my husband's last career. I was planning on going back to school when my daughter entered school, i was a stay at home mom before that. As far as living in the basement, we screwed up our credit when we were young, my husband was pretty much promised a part ownership of his father's company, and things didn't happen.

As far as not having a license, I was suicidal for a LONG TIME, and it was best I didn't have one than to have one and kill myself (or someone who was innocent). Why didn't I get help then? Because I was foolish, selfish, and blind.

I didn't come here to be mocked for my living situation, or my PAST decisions.

LG,
I have sympathy for what you are feeling and going through. My advice to you, right now..... if something that is said here is making you uncomfortable or angry even, see that there is most likely some truth in it. You might not like it, it might not be entirely the whole situation, but you will always find truth in it. I had a hard time at first with the blunt, honest truth, but LG, there is so much truth in it. Please don't let any pride or ego get in the way of seeing the truth behind the words people are trying to share with you. The upfrontness of ML's words are to wake you UP!!!!!! We really are here for you LG. Don't push us away - even if we say something you don't like. ALWAYS find the silver lining, OK?

LG, I'm the exact same age as you. I'd like to try and view Mel's advice as that of a woman who is a heck of a lot older and wiser than you. You have several older and wiser women with recovered marriages trying to counsel you, and you're still resisting it.

I get why. You really do think that you are refusing to draw the line because you think he will just come back eventually and you will put this all behind you. You fear proper separation because you would rather remain in a bad marriage rather than get divorced.

Someone with your history of depression and suicidal ideation is at the highest risk when allowing yourself to be continually exposed to a spouse who has no intention of recovery. If you won't do it for yourself, will you at least consider it for the child who going to watch her mother fall apart because she is scared of real independence? REAL independence. A driver's license or school is nothing compared to saying "I will not be treated like crap!".

These are even more reasons that Dr. Harley advised you to go to Plan B.

Dr. Harley wants you to better yourself and be independent AWAY from your WH. He wants you to get your depression under control which Dr. Harley advised medication.

You need to be away from your WH and work on YOU!

I won't stand for being treated like crap, and I also don't want to treat him like crap.

I don't want to 'put this behind me'... I wouldn't take him back if he wasn't willing to work on things the MB way.

yes, I know my situation is awful.. I'm not blind to that. I know I played my part in getting here. AND I am working on getting out of it, things can't just happen overnight, as much as I tried for them to.

I know a couple who will let me and my daughter stay at their house for a while, but I need my license first. As I do that, I will get a job, etc. There is no public transportation near me, I have no family, and my friends don't live close. I tried to get housing, and couldn't.

i WAS scared of independence, but now I want it, it's just all working against me... no matter how hard i try.

I hear you, LG! As BS, we are all more or less scared of independence. WH and I lived on our own in a different country from our early 20s, and I thought I am independent, but to the point that I have to live without my husband, to raise the 4yr old and 5 month old by myself, I AM scared. But, really, we don't have other choices. Living with WH with no intention of recovery is a torture everyday! You might find it intimidating living on your own, but once you start get prepared for it bit by bit, you will be ready.

It's not a matter of being intimidating, it's a matter of there's no possible way I can afford it (there's no possible way he can afford it, either, right now). Even with both of us working, it would be impossible.

Every single part of your situation indicates that you should be in Plan B.

Did you know that even if you were living in your own home with a lot of these issues resolved (job $$ etc) that Dr Harley typically advises a woman to move to Plan B when the WH has left the house?

There is absolutely ZERO reason for you to stay in Plan A.

~In fact, it wouldn't be Plan A - it would become Plan C, Plan Confusion or Chaos and is the most likely to lead to divorce.

~It would cause your mental health and general well-being to continue to deteriorate.

~This would be bad for your daughter - she needs at least one HEALTHY and WHOLE parent, especially given that the other is a wayward.

~In the case that you do move forward with the M at some point in the future, all the LB$ withdrawals from your WH will make it all that much harder for you to recover. BW who are desperate to keep their M don't see that big picture the way that we do.

~Focusing on your WH takes your focus off what you need to be doing for yourself and your child NOW.

To reiterate: Dr Harley doesn't think your M has a shot until you are able to stand on your own two feet - and that you need to be in Plan B in order to accomplish that. Makes perfect sense to me and it did to you until you picked the crackpipe up again (contact with your WH).

It should be noted that I got the sense that even if you get on your own two feet, that Dr Harley would not advise a reconciliation until you and your WH have demonstrated that you both have made changes so that you two don't just fall back into bad habits all over again.

You have gotten a very detailed plan from the BEST. All we can do is encourage you implement that advice. Nobody here is going to pat your back while you just go off and do your own thing. Sorry.

First off, I didn't attack you. And secondly, I am not in the LEAST BIT concerned about what you have been through. I am concerned about what you are GOING TO DO WITH YOUR LIFE. See, I came from a much worse background than you so I know there is no reason for you to be sitting in your mothers basement as an adult woman. We are trying to help you become an independent ADULT and the first step is ending your unhealthy dependency on your husband.

This is not true. Your husband has been treating you like an unpleasant barnacle for a long time. You have allowed this to happen.

I would be extremely depressed if I were in your shoes. Your depression will alleviate when you cut him out of your life and start working on being an accountable adult.

You don't know how he did or did not treat me..

I'm sorry you had a bad life...

I have no clue how to start BEING an "accountable adult" if I can't even get a place to live.

Actually I do. He has abandoned you.


Then what is your plan?

you don't know how he treated me before that, though.

We are in the present though.

and if I focus on the affair and ONLY the affair, I wouldn't see anything in him that is good - even the good things I see when I see him.

All husbands were great at sometime. You wish to subject yourself to no remorse or action towards recovery because he was a good guy once? Lonelygal, he's out drinking and who know what instead of seeking forgiveness on one knee. You let the past cripple the present on so many things. It blinds you to reality of your situation