We're only going on a month of Plan A but I've just about had it! I read LearningLife's post "Why do we want them back?" What I've been asking myself is Why am I even trying?<P>Just last week H told counselor that we could make time to do something as a couple once a week. He's in the middle of a schedule change at work so he's been off since Thurs. He has gone out everyday since then with friends. Today he wanted to go to another friends house and asked me if I minded. I said I did but that I didn't want him home either if he only stayed because I minded. I told him that he'd only want to be there and we would spend another night on the couch watching tv. When his friend called to see if he was going over or not, he said yes. I got upset, went to our bedroom, then eventually went out for about 3 hrs. He left as soon as I got home, said he'd be home right after wrestling was over. I called friends house and he told me that H was there but that he was passed out because he had drank too much. H doesn't drink much anymore. That was one of the problems we had over a year ago and he quit after he got a DUI. Now he won't be home until tomorrow. He knew that I was upset about him going and that I would be even more upset that he'd gotten drunk. He doesn't even care!!<P>He's the most selfish person I know!!! I caught him in a lie today too. When he left the 2nd time, it was a friday. He was supposed to work OT on Sat but didn't go in. When he came back and we really talked (one of the last times, I might add) I asked him if he had been with OW that night. He said yes but when I asked him if he'd been with her the night he left, he said no. Our phone bill came in last week. He had called her from our home that Fri night. Again I asked him if he had been with her that night as well as Sat. Again, he said no. He said that he had called her but hadn't gotten a hold of her. Come to find out, he called a hunting buddy of his in the early hours of Sat morning from her house. He was supposed to be at friends house to go hunting with him. He called to say that he was running late and would meet him at the spot they were going to hunt in. <P>He's not really trying. Sometimes I feel that he's only doing the bare minimum so when I've had enough and call it quits, he can save face with family and friends by saying that he tried and I just couldn't let it go.<P>Please help!! I am so fed up that I'm starting to lose love for him. We have 2 little kids and I don't want to break up their home. I refuse to go back to the way things were before. I not only wanted to save our marriage, I wanted to improve it for both of us. The kids and I will not be here for when it's convenient for him. I refuse to go back to that!!! Please help!!!!

Hon, you should continue your Plan A if it's only been a month.<P>If you walk away now, there will always be "what if's". If you Plan A, it helps make you a better, more understanding person. You want to Plan A for at least 6 months (on average) - then, if you do have to go to Plan B, it does two things: #1) It leaves your H with fond, loving memories of you working so hard to meet needs, and #2) It gives you the reassurance that you did absolutely everything you could to save your marriage, and you can walk away with less regrets, knowing that you are a better person. <P>You also don't want to keep trying to "catch" him doing something wrong. Trust me, I know it's hard - I began to think that my true calling was to be a P.I. there for awhile! But it really doesn't do you any good. Affairs make pathological liars out of WS's, and they will try to weasel their way out of everything. <P>Don't be ignorant, but don't be confrontational. The truth will begin to come when the WS can trust you with his feelings. If you blow up at him every time he tells you the truth about something, he will lie about it in the future to avoid confrontation. I don't agree with it, but I can explain it. If he's able to trust you with his feelings, and you're working to meet his needs, then he'll have no need to lie - or to have another woman in his life (<I>that's</I> when you make 'em pay you back )<P>So I would advise you to continue Plan A-ing longer, and be sure to take those LB's out!

Here is something I read periodically to get me through the day. Maybe it will help you to stay focused on taking care of you and not getting so caught up in what your husband is doing. You have no control, but by being kind and taking care of yourself, it may help to open his eyes. -- LL<P>Letting Go of What We Want<P>For those of us who have survived by controlling and surrendering, letting go may not come easily.<BR>Melodie Beatte, Beyond Codependency<BR>In living life to it's fullest, we learn that it is important to identify what we want and need. Where does this concept leave us? With a large but clearly identified package of currently unmet wants and needs. We've taken the risk to stop denying and to start accepting what we want and need. The problem is, the want or need hangs there, unmet. <P>This can be a frustrating, painful, annoying, and sometimes obsession-producing place to be. <P>After identifying our needs, there is a next step in getting our wants and needs met. This step is one of the spiritual ironies of living. The next step is letting go of our wants and needs after we have taken painstaking steps to identify them. <P>We let them go, we give them up - on a mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical level. Sometimes, this means we need to give up. It is not always easy to get to this place, but this is usually where we need to go. <P>How often I have denied a want or need, then gone through the steps to identify my needs, only to become annoyed, frustrated, and challenged because I don't have what I want and don't know how to get it. If I then embark on a plan to control or influence getting that want or need met, I usually make things worse. Searching, trying to control the process, does not work. I must, I have learned to my dismay, let go. <P>Sometimes, I even have to go to the point of saying, "I don't want it. I realize it's important to me, but I cannot control obtaining that in my life. Now, I don't care anymore if I have it or not. In fact, I'm going to be absolutely happy without it and without any hope of getting it, because hoping to get it is making me nuts - the more I hope and try to get it, the more frustrated I feel because I'm not getting it." <P>I don't know why the process works this way. <P>I know only that this is how the process works for me. I have found no way around the concept of letting go. <P>We often can have what we really want and need, or something better. Letting go is part of what we do to get it. <P>Today, I will strive to let go of those wants and needs that are causing me frustration. I will enter them on my goal list, then struggle to let go. I will trust God to bring me the desires of my heart, in God's time and in God's way.<BR>-Melody Beatte, The Language of Letting Go: Daily Meditations for Codependents©1990<BR>