Given the changes in circumstances as of late for me, I felt a need to redraft my Plan B letter. I didn't change too much, and it may change more on discussion with SH. But anyhow, have a go at it..<p>(If anyone needs an update, my latest situation is at: http://www.marriagebuilders.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=37&t=016455)<p>-----------
Given that you now understand what Plan B is about, this letter will probably not be a surprise to you. Let me assure you that I’m doing this not as a plan to “get you back,” but to “get me back.” It’s really to protect my remaining love for you, to help my love bank drain more slowly towards empty. I don’t know how long that timeframe will be, before empty is reached. For me, this just makes perfect sense.<p>
My Dear Connie,<p>God give me strength – this is the hardest thing I’ve had to write, ever.<p>Connie, I apologize to you from the bottom of my heart for my part in creating an environment that helped make your affair with both (OM1) and (OM2) possible. I’m determined to avoid the mistakes I’ve made in the past and create a new life for both of us that will be fulfilling and based on genuine love and respect. But I cannot do that until you end your relationship with (OM2) once and for all, and commit to making other specific changes in your life that are consistent with building a happy marriage.<p>In the past while, as I’ve said before, I’ve been able to reflect on things in a new light. I can see that I’ve tolerated your affair, out of my honest love for you, out of hope that you’d come to see that I can not only be your best friend, but also your romantic lover (your “sweet J.R.” using your own words), and that you’d accept this willingly. But now I realize that I’ve reached a point where I can do no more to show you this and it is simply too painful for me to continue. <p>Even though you have decided to leave in an effort to make sense of things, Connie, until you can commit to an honest effort of working on our life together, I will be suffering. As such, I will need to reduce contact with you to the bare minimum. In fact, I’ve asked --- to be our common contact point (contact info). In terms of contact with your family, I will provide a draft for you to edit - I feel it’s important for me to say something about my state of mind.<p>I don’t do this out of malice, revenge, or anything remotely like that. I do it to protect my remaining love for you. You certainly know about the suffering I have endured because of your relationship with (OM2), and the things that you have said over the past months, and I simply can’t maintain contact any longer, knowing that you persist in holding on to both of us. I still love you dearly but I cannot see you under these conditions, and continued contact threatens my remaining love for you. I do thank you sincerely for the times you have expressed love for me over the past six months – it’s strengthened me.<p>As soon as you are willing to permanently and fully separate from (OM2), I will be open to talking about the possibility of reconciliation, and the things necessary to build a strong future together. I would love to see our marriage restored some day. I want us to be best friends, create an environment where we can be joyous, avoid unhappiness, and thrive with passion and genuine bonding of husband and wife. I know that so very much is possible – and I hope that you do too. What do I see? A house, a garden, happy, beautiful children, thrilled grandparents, and us standing tall – simple things. I wish this for you and I. I have all along in my heart of hearts.<p>I loved you when we married and I continue to love you right up to this day. I just cannot be with you or help you as long as you are seeing (OM2).<p>With my truest love,
J.R.<p>--------------
Oh, and for OM, I'd remove the part before the Dear and put:<p>OM2,<p>I felt you should have a copy of what I've given to WW. As I told you, I love her dearly and will be there for her for as long as I can. Separation is still a state of marriage, and I am not about to initiate a divorce - that would need to be WW's choice.<p>[ March 17, 2002: Message edited by: J.R. ]</p>

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by J.R.:
<strong>Given that you now understand what Plan B is about, this letter will probably not be a surprise to you. Let me assure you that I’m doing this not as a plan to “get you back,” but to “get me back.” </strong> <hr></blockquote><p>I'd leave out the last sentence above. You're introducing the idea that what you're doing could be interpreted as a "get you back" gambit. When we bring something up and deny it, it puts a spotlight on it and tends to prompt the other person to pay extra attention and examine that idea even more closely, makes them more suspicious.<p> <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> <strong> It’s really to protect my remaining love for you, to help my love bank drain more slowly towards empty.</strong> <hr></blockquote><p>"I want to protect my remaining love for you and slow down the draining of my love bank." This already makes it obvious that it will eventually drain to empty, so no need to force it and come across as rubbing it in in any way.<p> <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> <strong>I don’t know how long that timeframe will be, before empty is reached. For me, this just makes perfect sense.</strong> <hr></blockquote><p>I'd leave this out, too. Same thing about the "empty" emphasis, and the "for me" and "perfect sense" sentence might be too challenging, like you're able to understand what makes sense, but she and her ideas don't make sense.<p> <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> <strong>My Dear Connie,<p>God give me strength – this is the hardest thing I’ve had to write, ever.<p>Connie, I apologize to you from the bottom of my heart for my part in creating an environment that helped make your affair[s] with both (OM1) and (OM2) possible. I’m determined to avoid the mistakes I’ve made in the past and create a new life for both of us that will be fulfilling and based on genuine love and respect. But I cannot do that until you end your relationship with (OM2) once and for all, and commit to making other specific changes in your life that are consistent with building a happy marriage. </strong> <hr></blockquote><p>Great! I personally might be a little more emphatic with "until you end your R with OM for life" or "until you permanently end your R with OM", but that's probably just a matter of style rather than substance.<p> <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> <strong>In the past while, as I’ve said before, I’ve been able to reflect on things in a new light. I can see that I’ve tolerated your affair, out of my honest love for you, out of hope that you’d come to see that I can not only be your best friend, but also your romantic lover (your “sweet J.R.” using your own words), and that you’d accept this willingly. But now I realize that I’ve reached a point where I can do no more to show you this and it is simply too painful for me to continue. </strong> <hr></blockquote><p>The "I've tolerated your affair" phrase makes me uncomfortable like it conveys weakness and implies that you might tolerate more abuse despite whatever else you're saying. Maybe a more negative approach with a clearer line drawn:<p>"My honest love for you and hope that you'd come to see that I can not only be your best friend, but also your romantic lover (your "sweet J.R."), have enabled me to endure these past months, the most painful of my life, but I've reached a point where it is too painful to continue, and I will no longer tolerate your R with OM."<p>Also, "sweet J.R." in quotations marks sufficiently shows where it came from. Adding the "your own words" part has more of a 'gotcha' feel to it to me.<p> <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> <strong>Even though you have decided to leave in an effort to make sense of things, Connie, until you can commit to an honest effort of working on our life together, I will be suffering. As such, I will need to reduce contact with you to the bare minimum.</strong> <hr></blockquote> <p>I wouldn't call attention to what she's decided to do. Could imply that you're assigning her motives for what she does, and even if it's what she's told you herself, she may not want you to parrot back what she said and then counter with something about yourself. And this letter is about you and your choices, so better to focus there.<p>"The pain and suffering that your continued R with OM causes me makes it necessary for me to avoid contact with you until you have ended all contact with OM and are ready to work with me to build our life together."<p> <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> <strong>In fact, I’ve asked --- to be our common contact point (contact info). In terms of contact with your family, I will provide a draft for you to edit - I feel it’s important for me to say something about my state of mind.<p>I don’t do this out of malice, revenge, or anything remotely like that. I do it to protect my remaining love for you. </strong> <hr></blockquote><p>Once again, I wouldn't insert any negative interpretations like malice, revenge, etc., just:<p>"I am doing this to protect my remaining love for you."<p> <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> <strong> You certainly know about the suffering I have endured because of your relationship with (OM2) and the things that you have said over the past months, and I simply can’t maintain contact any longer, knowing that you persist in holding on to both of us. </strong> <hr></blockquote><p>I'd avoiding lumping yourself in with OM or putting the two of you in any category together at all. Instead:<p>".....knowing that you persist in your R with OM."<p>Maintain your separateness as the better, more attractive man, above the morass that she's mired herself in, in a posture ready to give her a rescuing hand so that she can her find her way out of it.<p> <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> <strong> I still love you dearly but I cannot see you under these conditions, and continued contact threatens my remaining love for you. </strong> <hr></blockquote><p>I'd change the emphasis here:<p>"I still love you dearly, but I cannot see you because continued contact under these conditions threatens my remaining love for you."<p> <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> <strong> I do thank you sincerely for the times you have expressed love for me over the past six months – it’s strengthened me.</strong> <hr></blockquote><p>Good positive reinforcement!<p> <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> <strong>As soon as you are willing to permanently and fully separate from (OM2), I will be open to talking about the possibility of reconciliation and the things necessary to build a strong future together. I would love to see our marriage restored some day. I want us to be best friends, create an environment where we can be joyous, avoid unhappiness, and thrive with passion and genuine bonding of husband and wife. I know that so very much is possible – and I hope that you do too. What do I see? A house, a garden, happy, beautiful children, thrilled grandparents, and us standing tall – simple things. I wish this for you and I. I have all along in my heart of hearts.<p>I loved you when we married and I continue to love you right up to this day. I just cannot be with you or help you as long as you are seeing (OM2).<p>With my truest love,
J.R.
</strong> <hr></blockquote><p>BEAUTIFUL!<p> <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> <strong>
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Oh, and for OM, I'd remove the part before the Dear and put:<p>OM2,<p>I felt you should have a copy of what I've given to WW. As I told you, I love her dearly and will be there for her for as long as I can. Separation is still a state of marriage, and I am not about to initiate a divorce - that would need to be WW's choice.</strong><hr></blockquote><p>I'd eliminate "for as long as I can"--leaves him too much of an opening implying that you will give up eventually. Also, "will be there for her" is kind of contradictory to what you wrote to WW about no contact, which could affect your credibility in their eyes since WW will likely see this note, too.<p>I'd also leave out the mention of divorce because you want your future intentions about that to be a mystery to WW, something to wonder and worry about. You don't want to appear to be a sure thing that she can fall back on who-knows-when. I think evoking some agitation and urgency with keeping that a mystery is better.<p>Maybe just simply this to:<p>"As I told you, I love my wife [I'd definitely emphasize that part of her identity!] dearly, and I consider separation a state of marriage."<p>This makes it clear to OM that you are very much in the picture and not severing your R with WW, and maintains the mystery and urgency for WW because you COULD file for D at any time, especially if you find life without her and the misery she's been causing you to be an attractive alternative.<p>I know it's emotionally draining to have to write the Plan B letter, but you did a very good job, J.R. Thanks for letting me help with the tweaking. [img]images/icons/smile.gif" border="0[/img]

JR, <p>Beautiful letter...... just a thought?!?!? <p>Don't be soo quick to say that as soon as she is over the OM that you would be willing to work on reconciliation. Temper it a bit with something more like, when you are able to think about us as a couple/family again, let me know and if I can talk about it also, I will let you know. <p>See the reason is if the WS and OP know that in the background you are still waiting, why rush? Fogese dictates that they use every piece of your patience. So if you have enduring love and patience that would last a lifetime, fine but why let them know that? IMHO, the WS needs to that you are moving forward. Yes, you love your W but you will no longer put yourself nor your family at their (WS/OP) mercy. <p>JMHO,
L.<p>ps: learn to dicipher real talk from babble when your W speaks with you. Don't place emphasis nor make plans on the babble. Remember if it sounds like babble and makes you wonder what are they saying, maybe it is and you need to proceed with caution.<p>[ March 17, 2002: Message edited by: Orchid ]</p>