At this moment,my H and I are planning to attend the MB seminar in San Fran. I say, at this moment because he changes his mind on everything not only daily but from one minute to the next. His most recent OW has moved out of state and since that time,(two months ago) he has been even more erratic in his behavior than usual.

He is beligerent, manipulative, or-rarely-, nice and responsive. I never know what's going on in his head.

S.H. is certain that he is not playing a "doubles match" within our marriage but he is simply playing one on one with someone else. In other words, we are not on the same team.

Well, hoping that we make the seminar... it is a few weeks away.

Any input welcomed.

What SH's advice ?.

-rh-

I don't know what the results will be. But I am going, I mean with my WH. Your Wh's behavior sounded very familiar to me. See you there.

i hope you get lots of replies. i posted a similar question under the GQII forum about the MB seminar and "reluctant" spouses and didn't get one reply! well maybe just one, i finally gave up on the topic. good luck and prayers to you.

Thanks for posting everyone...

Redhat, SH suggests we go to the seminar to expose my WH to a different value system, one that WH has not even considered before. My H is a repeat WH with many "friends" typically one at a time.

We have two children and they are the main focus of my effort. Even though my heart has broken repeatedly, SH says that rebuilding the M with a different set of values in place is the only way to overome the hurt and pain the children and I have faced.

I am dragging him to the seminar under duress while still in plan A. Many outside observers feel I have just accepted his Wayward ways. My stomach churns when I think that they believe this, however, that's not my biggest problem.

My H controls me by emotional abuse and threatens to destroy me financially when he gets in one of his moods. Sometimes, I wish I could just cut out but something prevents me. Is it out of fear or love...?

I wish I knew.

Please read my previous post...OW moves...WH makes serious threats.

pariskev2003,

You know one thing that had happened to me ... I got my WS to counsel w/ SH not to work on M but to help to fix me. She learned about 4 gifts of love and so on ... she used it to get OM away from OMW and put NC on me. She became OW from hell, I felt guilty about it (one of the reason I had helped OMexW to move on).

Another example ... OM had cheated his W and went to counseling .5 years before he met my W. Life seemed beautiful acccording to OMexW. The MC uses MB principal. I do beleive OM used it to pursue my W later.

I am not your conselor and didn't get the insight of your H's thinking. This is my 2¢ If this seminar you hope could change your WH's value system ... good luck!. This seminar might gave your WH a tool to create in-love feeling from OW. Serial cheater needs to get IC for whatever problem they have not sending them to learn more tools.

Just my 2¢. Now I better shut up before anyone throw 2x4 to me.

-rh-

RH, I hope that is not will happen to us.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> Sometimes, I wish I could just cut out but something prevents me. Is it out of fear or love...?
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Unless it is out of love, I don't think the healing can happen in this situation.

And I think he needs to understand that it is out of love that you stay, and not out of fear...do you see?

Shul

In our situation WH had to do IC and fix himself before he was ready to take an active rolein our marriage. It was hard for me to be patient and still is infact C gave me a braclet with patience beaded on it to help me remember lol. Anyway my WS never had good examples for a father and a mother in fact his father played around alot and that was his role model. WH had to learn what real marriage values were about. When his outlook changed his actions changed he began going to church, began to see me as a good person although he still hasn't the feeling for me due to work contact I believe with OW. And he realizes what it takes to be a father and how important that is and how unimportant work is that work is not were you get your worth from. So I don't mean to put words in RH mouth as he as always been a great help to me but I believe what he is saying is that if H is not ready to commit to marriage or you and he learns these skills he may use them elsewhere where is old values are about.
Rh nice to "see" you and I like you new sig line although you didn't use it here
km4

lostnhurt ... I hope not <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="images/icons/shocked.gif" /> .

km4 ... you know me well ... yeap that what I always afraid of happening for unrepentant WS.

-rh-

I think that this forum tends to be for people who have a spouse who won't attend. It took me two years to get my H to attend and it was during that time that I was on MB. I see people posting on the private forum who have never been on the public one. Everyone else has post #1 or post #2, and I have post # 1001+! In fact, I have more posts than Dr. Harley!

Boy, just got back from a harrowing weekend in Chicago with my family. Nothing I could do was right according to my H/WH. Oh well.

I am interested to hear,Cherished, that it took you a long time to get your H to the seminar because it has taken me about that long to get mine to go as well. I still would like to hear about some results. So ultimately, did your H go? How are things now? Did you see any noticeable improvement?

Any insight is welcomed.

As for Shul, when I mentioned what you said in your post to SH, he said that ultimately I am in this for love. He said, even if my motivation is fear of manipulation, that when I overcome this, I will still want more out of my relationship than JUST the absence of fear. I will want a fulfilling, loving relationship with the father of my children.

Lost, I hope we see some results.

We never did go. D-day was MAy, 2002. I tried in August, 2002 and January, 2003. No deal. We poured money into IC and MC with no results.

In the meantime, I called Harley's radio show perhaps 20 times. December 9 was the first anniversary of the third and last surgery for the arm he broke December 17, 2001 when I was threatening to call this woman whom he said was calling him and it would be rude of him to hang up. Anyway, something just plain clicked.

I sat him down, told him the current MC was telling me "the concept of care doesn't make sense to him" and recommending at minimum a long-term separation, and then said we can try MB or not -- your choice. He decided to try MB.

We were able to get the material for follow-up to the seminar through a new program offering from the newsletter, so we never did attend the MB seminar. It is very touch and go for us now, but I must say that it is giving me a whole lot of insight into why I reacted the way I did, not at all concerned about my ulna being broken in 7 pieces and practically having a nervous breakdown when I found out about the affair. We do not have a relationship. However, we are on lesson #3 of HN/HN, which is affection, and we will continue to work on it. Harley defines affection as the behavior which shows the decision to care.

I will say that the money spent on this program was far better than the money spent on MC, which was about $6,000. Any more questions -- keep posting. My D wants the computer.
Cherished

PS Harley spoke on the phone with both my H and me because of the severity of the abuse -- I appreciate that -- he wanted to make sure it was safe for us to go through the program.

Cherished, I have read your posts in the past and have been amazed at your stamina. I have been married for 16 years now to a repeat WS. As I said before, I want a real relationship with my H however he continually says that I just want a "fantasy" life i.e., (I think he means an affair-free M).

I pray and look for miracles because my patience is running so thin. I often feel, as I have said previously, of cutting out. Then I see the faces of my children and see how much they love their D. They know he hurts my feelings but are incapable of changing his attitude toward me. This weekend, my 13 yr. old wanted me to go shopping along with dad. My H made such a big stink about me coming along that I took my D and we went somewhere else. It is as if my H is trying to seperate me from my S as much as possible, never including my daughter or me in activities my H does with my S.

I feel as if I am already D.

I know I am on a tangent here but it all ties in with his resistance to change, his belief system which is flawed, and his insistance that I am expecting the impossible.

Harley has a very straightforward approach to marriage. You make a commitment to care -- you will do what you can to make your spouse happy without making yourself unhappy and you will be honest. An affair is doing what makes you feel happy while making spouse unhappy if spouse knows about it.

He starts with affection. Can we reach win-win agreements on how to show affection to each other? We got in a discussion about cards -- isn't that funny? Abuse, neglect, and infidelity all will start to end if we have enough respect for each other to figure out what type of cards to give, when to give, whether to give, etc.

I would summarize the program as three things:
Commit to giving each other 15 hours of undivided attention each week.
Never do anything without the enthusiastic agreement of your spouse.
Be radically honest.

I wish I could have gotten my H to the seminar but I am happy that we are going through the program.
Cherished

Hello everyone,

It is 5 days and counting till we get on the plane for San Fran. This trip could still be sabotaged because as I have said, he changes his mind minute by minute. One moment he's nice, next he's argumentative and beligerant.

I looked up Narcissistic Personality Disorders and this fits him to a "T". I guess I don't want to get into the trap of believing that he has a disability because then I can just place all the blame on the disability and not work toward a solution.

Well, pray that we go on the trip. Even if he refuses to go through the program, at least he will have been exposed to a different philosophy, one that his "friends" do not ascribe to.

Our MC diagnosed him as narcissistic, but we still are going through MB.

Dear ParisKev,

You are going to benefit you. You also believe it will benefit your H. It could and it may. He is the one that has to give it a chance.

Even though he is still having a bad attitude and mood swings, there is a chance the seminar will move those mood swings in a positive manner.

At the very least you have given a good method a good try. I think you have more working in your favor by going.

I have personally not attended one...yet. Want to but circumstances prohibit it at this time.

However, since you are coming to our area, you are invited to join us for dinner. RH and I will be headed up to dinner near where you will be having that seminar. H & I will already be up that way in a Nikken class earlier in the day.

We may or may not be able to meet other MB couples there. I understand Lostnhurt along with Momto3boys and her H will be there. I think there are a couple more.

If you want to meet us, I can get you the specifics. RH is suppose to figure out which restaurant to meet at.

My e-mail addy: mborchid2@yahoo.com

<img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

L.

ps: My H (xws) will be there also. Maybe good if your H and mine chat a bit. Maybe KS41 and her H c/b there?!?!? Hope so.

Orchid, thanks sooo much for inviting us to this dinner. I must say that I think it would be great. The big HOWEVER is that my H hardly wants to be at the seminar much less associate with other MBr's. We are leaving the Gateway hotel Fri.night and going to another hotel in S.F.. He is under the assumption that nothing is wrong with our M except me.

He feels I am the one with unrealistic
expectations of M, that I fantasize about a loving relationship where H and W are in love with one another. He says that doesn't happen. He and I are individuals who live together and have children together. We each have our own set of ideas and plans. Why then does he spend so much time, $$$, and energy chasing these 20 yr olds?

I don't know where current OW is right now but I'm certain she is in his thoughts... He has changed his password yet again and has installed MSM messenger service so perhaps he even has another screen name and password. Oh well, I am tired of all the lies and secrets he keeps.

I would like to know where you are getting together in the event I have the courage to bring it up. I don't know if any of you suffer from the FEAR of asking or saying the wrong thing in your M but I just hate to upset him because he gets SO beligerant and angry at the slightest thing.

Well, thanks again.

Keep us in your thoughts. P.

PK,

As for his changing moods, let's just say that most WS have bad bad bad PMS - phony marital syndrome - LOL!!! Attitude changes are constant.

I learned NOT to tell H stuff. Instead I'd let him invite me to ask him questions.

ex:

BS: Can I ask you a question? (very soft and lighthearted).

The first time he was angry and then I walked away. He never heard the question because I refused to talk while he was in his anger.

The next time I did the same, I waited a few minutes (talk travels slow and distorted in the fog). Then when he answered like a WS, I walked away.

The 3rd time I asked (this went over the period of a few days), I first asked if he was the H or WS at the time and went on to say that if he was the H, I had a question to ask. You should have been there to see him morph back to an H. I asked my question.

A few other times when he would morph into the WS, I would end the convo and walk away. He learned how to keep himself as the H and this was a learning experience. Kinda funny and scary to look at his fact get distorted as if he was fighting an inner demon. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="images/icons/shocked.gif" />

As for our dinner. Don't push it. Just let him know you heard about either a dinner or brunch and wanted to know if he wanted to join you..... for moral support. Let him know that at least 1 other WS w/b there. If he is hestiant, let it go. Maybe ask a couple of days before you leave. Let it stew in his mind for a while. Ask again Friday night and then again Saturday night.

E-mail me and I can give you my cell#.

take care,
L.