Please post tips and links to help those BS trying plan A but being treated poorly by WS or going through divorce. I think several posters would benefit. How do you handle various situations without lovebusting or being disrespectful.

I have posted examples of how to do this for years. Just look at my posting history and see what I've advised men to do, based on Dr. Harley's plans. It worked for me!

Thought it would be good to put as much as possible in one place. I did pull all your posts and started to read it all.. anyway.. this could be a good thread to refer people to if we could consolidate some of the information... Plan A 101 if you will. You don't need to link anything here, but you could help many people who need a crash course if you do.

Dr Harley talked about this on the show on Thursday 25th. If you were to summarise his advice from that, you would have the information that you want, here on this thread.

Here is Dr Harley's tip:

"Plan A is for the betrayed spouse to negotiate with the wayward spouse to totally separate from the lover without angry outbursts, disrespectful judgments, and selfish demands. These three Love Busters not only ruin any effort to reach a negotiated settlement, but they also make the betrayed spouse much less attractive to the wayward spouse. Instead of encouraging total separation from the lover, the anger, disrespect and demands of the betrayed spouse make the lover appear to be the only one who truly cares about the wayward spouse. They literally throw the wayward spouse into the arms of the lover."

And here is the link: What Are Plan A and Plan B?

In short: do not do those things he warns against.

Can you do this in plan A?
"I'm not saying that you can't disagree with your spouse. But I want you to respectfully disagree. Try to understand your spouse's reasoning. Present the information that brought you to your opinion and listen to the information your spouse brings. Entertain the possibility that you might change your own mind, instead of just pointing out how wrong your spouse is"

It has been said that having thoughts of disagreement with WS is disrespectful. ...

Where has that been said? Link?

That says that having thoughts of disagreement about your WS is disrespectful?

What it says, specifically and quoting -

"I'm not saying that you can't disagree with your spouse. But I want you to respectfully disagree."

sorry.. let me clarify..

Dr Harley's article says that you CAN disagree provided that you do it in a respectful way. Comments to Lostonwestcoast and even to me were that "even if you have thoughts about disagreeing" with the wayward spouse... that shows through... so it is disrespectful.

I think the conversation needs to be... what do you do when you think your WS is doing something completely horrible but still show respect... you can't control your thoughts about something you feel is completely wrong... Lost and I have had the same thoughts... the comments seem to indicate that we cannot even think those thoughts without being disrespectful. How do we solve this problem?

I had a weird conversation with my WW today...
Basically... I need to work out a deal with her for custody or face $7K cost for mediation or $70K cost for a trial... My kids and I have already been wiped out financially so I said that I would sit down and talk to her about custody even though I did not want divorce. I tired sending this stuff just through the attorneys, but nothing seemed to be getting across... it's as if they don't want to resolve anything but rather have us end up in trial. Now, there is a trial deadline looming, and trust me... fighting in court is a huge love buster.

She said that she had been treating me like crap for over a year... why would I not want to divorce her? I said.. your right, you have been treating me horribly for the last year or so... not a DJ because I am agreeing with what she said right?

What else do I say to that?

This isn't complicated. Disagreement is a matter of perspective or opinion. Disrespect is a behavior. You can't avoid disagreement, it's simply your perception of a situation happening to be different than someone else's.

But you can avoid a behavior. All lovebusters are behaviors. The statement about "thoughts of disagreement" being a DJ are incorrect or incorrectly understood, regardless of where they were said.

On her statement to you, and your response...why would you say what you said?

Forget about its truthfulness or whether she said it first. You can say very disrespectful things to someone while being honest or repeating their own words.

Why did you respond in that way?

I asked you for a link to such a comment, and you have not provided one.

If you are going to say that people on this forum posted something that is contrary to what Dr Harley advises, you need to back that up. You cannot just make such a claim, about people such as I who spend a great deal of time helping people apply Dr Harley's concepts, without justification.

Where is your link to that statement?

Let me know if you want me to spend the time finding all the quotes... but basically lost shares his inner thoughts..

WW is wasting all our assets... I build up over all this time.. .that really bothers him.

The posters then say having these thoughts is a disrespectful judgement because the thoughts are "bound to show through"...

The posters may be absolutely correct that this is true.

My only point is that Dr Harley does NOT say anything about having "thoughts" being a disrespectful judgement. He says that it's OK so long as you keep those thoughts to yourself.

If the "thoughts" really are a problem... how do you change your thoughts???

The only way I have figured out how to change my thoughts is to put myself in my wife's shoes and try to see things through her point of view.. If I were addicted to something and felt entitled... then I can begin to imagine things through here eyes and avoid being disrespectful of her...

The other way I avoid disrespect.. is I think about the fact that I don't have respect for some of the choices and I certainly don't like the situation that we were in, but I still respect my WW as a person. The problem is Dr Harley says, there are reasons for an affair but no excuses... so how do you show respect for the affair??? The only way I can find a way to show respect is that we all make mistakes.. and some are big ones... I have made mistakes too in my life, so who am I to judge the mistake my WW is making? Anyway you slice it though... and affair is a mistake and figuring out how to respect it is very difficult for a BS. Do you understand where I am coming from in all this?

I guess that I said it that way because I agreed with her. I did not think it would be disrespectful.. I guess if I were to dissect the exact words... if she said " I have treated you horribly" and I said " I have felt horribly mistreated".. that would not be disrespectful. I can see your point though.. if I said " yeah.. you sure did treat me horribly.. you are a horrible mean person" that would be an obvious DJ.

On another note... My WW asked me to write the divorse agreement. I have copied the "memorandum of agreement" from SAA and the checklist to ending an affair. I was going to give this to her and say that she may select to sign this agreement at any time to end the divorce.

She won't sign it of course, but it would give her in writing the kind of marriage I could offer her.. and she will always have it to think about.

Is that a good idea????

Here is one of the quotes:

In this case, we are talking about Lost's disrespectful thoughts or opinions. Dr Harley says that it is not a DJ to have a thought or opinion.. it's a DJ if you communicate it in a disrespectful way.

Why do we say that we have to respect everything? If someone murders someone... we don't have to have respect for that decision.


Here is a quote from Dr Harley in one of his articles on DJ's

http://www.marriagebuilders.com//graphic/mbi5039_qa.html

"I know you have tried to be tolerant of her beliefs, but as her decisions have become increasing hard on you, you may be showing her disrespect when you don't intend to. Be very careful that you focus attention on how her decisions affect you, rather than on the truth of the belief behind the decision. "

He is not saying that you have agree or "respect" the idea.. but you can talk about how the decision effects you???? right??

Lets just suppose that you were having trouble paying the bills because your wife is a SAHM... but now the kids are grown, expenses have gone up, and your need for conversation is not being met in the marriage. I know this is a really delicate issue... but can't you say "honey, because you don't work, I am feeling a lot stress to pay all the bills" Also, " I feel very lonely when I have no one to talk to at the end of the day because you don't want to spend time together after work.. or we don't go to bed at the same time because our schedules are so different"...

Based on what Dr Harley talks about... it would seem to me that this is a perfectly respectful way to have the conversation. Thought????

How can you not see the issue in what you've just said.

"because you don't work"
"because you don't want to spend time with me"

This is blaming her and being disrespectful.

Look at one of Dr. Harley's examples it's a written letter but it shows a huge difference.


" The problem I'd like us to solve is that, from my perspective, we are not making love often enough, and when we do it's not in ways that satisfy me. I would like to make love at least twice a week, and before we make love, I'd like us to spend some time talking to each other and being affectionate. I think that we could do this if we scheduled time to be together each week for that purpose -- like having a date.

After you've stated the problem and described your perspective, you should ask for your spouse's perspective. How does he or she feel about the problem itself and about your proposed solution?

How do you feel about it? Do you also feel that we're not making love often enough, and that we're not doing it in ways that satisfy you? If so, how would you like to solve this problem? But if you are happy with how often we make love and find that the way we do it is fulfilling to you, would you help me with this problem I've been having? What would you suggest to satisfy my need? Please write me a response so that we can begin solving this problem together."

No blaming, no you statements, nothing like that.

Let me try again:

How about:

From my perspective, living on a single income, I feel that it is very difficult to pay our bills. I also feel very lonely because we don't seem to spend enough time together.

or...

I feel very hurt that one of us has been having an affair. I also feel very sad that so much of our wealth is being destroyed because of all the legal costs associated with this affair. When I see the children mistreated and put in the middle of all this, that also makes me very sad.

You can see that I have reworded... but I'm afraid that if you read between the lines, the same message is going to come out. We are just playing with words.

Why do we think this is so simple??? this is really NOT easy. I can see that if both parties are avoiding DJ's and following the POJA.. this is very easy. But when one is completely behaving independantly... this is very very difficult. That's why I opened this thread. THIS IS VERY HARD for many of us. We are honestly looking for guidance.. we want to be the people we can be. This is not easy stuff.

I think Dr Harley also said it's ok to say "when you do this... I effects me this way"...

so is it OK to say..

"when you don't work, I feel very stressed about paying all the bills" it's a subtle difference... because all you are saying is when you do something I feel good, when you don't do something I feel bad... that's not at all disrespectful, right?