Hello-I have a question regarding POJA, specifically the part where the default option is "do nothing" until an agreement is negotiated.

Years ago, before I knew anything about MB, I reluctantly agreed to my husband taking a job that I was not enthusiastic about. Since finding MB, recovering from an emotional affair and making many changes in our marriage, my only real point of unhappiness in our marriage is his job. He is wonderful at meeting my needs, but this job situation continues to make LB withdrawals. He does have some dishonesty issues too that cause withdrawals, but the dishonesty is almost always around the job situation, so I feel if he was working a job I was happy about, he wouldn't feel the need to lie to me about it.

Here's the short version of the story - the job is bringing in no income at all right now. He works for the owner of a small business and is supposedly going to inherit the business when the owner dies/retires, but we have nothing in writing to ensure that will happen. At its worst, it has actually cost us money. While it is possible we will inherit the business some day and make enough money to cover these years of loss/no income, I am not convinced that will happen. There are lots of little details to this, but the bottom line is I am not enthusiastic about the situation and the resentment is growing each day.

H agrees that the situation is kind of crazy and is open to negotiating something that we both agree with. I am open to him being involved on some level with the business in the hopes of owning it one day...perhaps on a very part time basis, or something along those lines.

My question - the "do nothing" default....until we figure out something we're both happy with, is "do nothing" continuing to work this job until we figure something else out? Or is "do nothing" him not working at the job until something else is agreed to?

Thanks.

Do nothing means he doesn't work there until and unless an enthusiastic decision is reached. And that decision might be to not return at all.

If he's going to follow the policy, then he can't report for work until you're enthusiastic about him reporting to work.

Do you think he'll follow the policy?

I don't know...he views not reporting to work as potentially harming the business, his clients, other employees, etc... as "taking an action"...not "doing nothing". I don't want to try to read his mind, but from our discussions, it seems his version of "doing nothing" is sticking with the status quo until we figure something else out.

It also doesn't help that I'm a pretty emotional person and making a complaint, then sitting back to see what he does about it stresses me out. I tend to want resolution to a problem immediately, while he's a sit back and think about it for awhile kind of guy. Admittedly, I have agreed to things in the past just to get to a resolution and then decided later I wasn't so enthusiastic after all. I'm really trying not to do that this time. We have enthusiastically agreed to him taking more time off from the job to do things around the house, work on our home based business, etc.. He has Saturday off and we're planning on sitting down and hammering out some ideas then.

What matters is how Dr Harley "views" the POJA, since it is his rule. What you describe is not the proper use of the POJA. The POJA dictates that you STOP DOING the thing that is harming your marriage. You don't keep doing it. NOT going to work is NOT taking an action, it is to STOP doing something that is harming your marriage.


Which is an admission that he prioritizes all those less important people over his marriage. His actions ARE harming his marriage.

You can REFUSE to use the program, but continuing to go to work is a violation of the POJA. And if your H refuses to follow the POJA, Dr Harley would say "I don't give this much hope."

I am not disagreeing at all, ML. Which is why I wanted you guys to confirm what "do nothing" is in our case.

The prioritizing of the other things over the marriage is exactly what bothers me about the situation.

So, after seeing the replies to my question last night, I told him what was said and we did some negotiating.

Admittedly, we are not as skilled at negotiating as I would like...we're still learning. We honestly don't have many differences in opinion other than this.

While we haven't come up with a long term solution that we're both enthusiastic about, we were able to come up with a 60 day plan that we're both enthusiastic about. The 60 days will give us time to brainstorm ideas for how things will be after 60 days. Here is what we came up with:

He will drop his hours to half time. No more than 3 days a week, no more than 7 hours on each of those three days. This will give him 4 days a week for UA time (which isn't currently a problem...we easily get 20+ hours a week anyway), projects around the house, working on our home business and possibly a 2nd part time job.

If we have a vacation planned, his time off for that is in addition to only working half time. For example, if we have a week off for a camping trip, he doesn't work extra hours the week before and after.

Not a single cent of ours will go into that business again unless we own it. No putting business expenses on our credit cards, no making trips in our car and not getting reimbursed for mileage, etc...

There is one particular employee that we both agree will be very affected if/when he leaves the business for good. This guy has some mental health issues and for whatever reason, my H is about the only person in the world he trusts. We both want to help him if the business folds because of my H leaving. But we agree we can't let this person's welfare come before our marriage. During the 60 days, we will determine what resources we can get this guy in touch with, research some organizations that might help him find work, determine if there is a place in our home business for this person, etc...

At the end of the 60 days, we will have a face to face meeting with the business owner to discuss what we need for my husband to continue working there. I must be present at this meeting. We've had issues in the past where my husband agrees to things the owner wants/knows I won't be happy about them and lies to me about them. Me being able to meet with the owner and hear exactly what is going on should create transparency.

I am in agreement with this as long as it really is only for 60 days and then we re-negotiate where we need to go from there and as long as he sticks to the plan. This morning we chatted again and neither seemed to have second thoughts after sleeping on it for a night, so I'm hopeful that we have an agreement. I think I made it clear that if he wavers on any of this, it could cost him the marriage.

You did good!!! Negotiating is a hard thing to learn and you just have to stick with it.