Jefe - Climbing out of the mire - #8

[Sotto]

Hi Jefe - praying hard sounds like being attached. Just let go for now. Let her be.

Remember, you don't have to be tethered to her boat, whirling around at sea. You can be the lighthouse. You see the boat. It tosses about, but doesn't pull you with it. But you are there, solid & strong on the headland, bedded in the rock. The boat can see you.

Don't feel angry with yourself, but learn for next time, and do it differently.

Toots :-)

[labug]

Yes, let go. Believe that her life is hers to live. It may not be what you'd choose but it's not for you to choose. YOu made your won wacky choices in the past.

Sometimes order does come from chaos.

[UpperCu]

Jefe, what are your plans for Christmas and New Years?

Anything else new in the pipeline for the next few months?

[Jefe]

We, the girls and I, have a Cristmas party to go to tonight and we have one next Friday as well. Besides that, I have no plans for New Years or Christmas and I'm not particularly looking forward to either. Any arrangement we come up with, somebody looses. And the kids loose no matter what the arrangement. But it's out of my control and I just have to accept it for what it is.

Maybe I'm too emotionally attached, maybe I'm just plain mentally I'll. Maybe I'm just too selfish. I just don't know.

Nothing new in the pipeline other that trying to change my employment situation to something a little more predictable and stable. I understand this is largely my fault and this may be the only thing I have control over at the moment but I feel just so hopeless. The future looks so uncertain and scary. This too shall pass. The past 30 days have just really taken a toll on my PMA. I look back to 60 days ago and I think I was functioning a lot better. I could be wrong, though. It wouldn't be the first time.

Detach seems to be the word for the week. I'm working on it.

For some reason in my head I feel like if I detach it means I don't care. I get that this is crazy thought, but it's there in my head none the less.

One of the topics we discussed last night was happiness. She doesn't understand why everyone isn't concerned with her happiness and why we can't understand that if she is happy the kids will be happier.

She's right. I don't understand.

Getting past the holidays and the funeral will a monumental achievement for me.

[labug]

But it's out of my control and I just have to accept it for what it is.

Don't let the "out of your control" truism absolve you of all responsibility. We all have to accept where we are and there's always someone who has it worse.

It is in your control to make the best of the hand you've been dealt. If you live with the belief that W is ruining things for your kids, that's the message they'll get.

You have control over how you do this.

[labug]

http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubb...555#Post2059555

When I read your posts for some reason I think of Busto. I've had this saved in my favorites forever. I'm not sure (it's been a long time since I've read it) but I think it must relate to your story in some ways. His ability to detach, even when he didn't want to, is
instructive.

[labug]

This is after he and W reconciled, a summary if you will:

I did the usual of I think many people of overpursuing at the beginning, pleading, groveling, apologizing (and very innocuous things come across as pursuit).

Once I regained my equilibrium and found DB and the community on here, I tried to do aspects of LRT (which really is respecting and listening to your partner's decision not to be in a relationship with you at that time), giving her tons of space, stopping pursuit, totally stopped calling her, texting her, etc, and working on myself physically, emotionally, spiritually.

We had a fair amount of interaction in the context of our kids (perhaps too much?), but whenever SHE would bring up the subject of our R or past hurts I had done to her, I would validate, validate, validate. If I did anything more than just validate (like broach the idea of reconciliation or going to a counselor or anything like that), it would consistently backfire. In my case, I learned that I really could not be the initiator of any of those ideas because it didn't work (in hindsight, probably because she experienced it as invalidating her feelings of anger and resentment and as selfish, self-serving and more of ignoring her feelings on my part). In the context of these interactions, I apologized for my role in the marriage and made it clear to her that I acknowledged ways in which I had effed up and hurt her, and that I was prepared to do my share of the work to repair things.

This time also gave me the opportunity to really listen to her in ways I had not before. To try to get to know my W again and hear or see messages she had been sending to me before that I had missed or ignored. To learn the way my W communicated.

Whenever she would initiate a contact with me, I would have as much of my mojo on as I could. Warm, friendly, funny, even flirty, the guy I was before things went south between us. Not sad, droopy dog. Not homebound separated guy. Not cuckolded guy letting his W have an EA or PA on his watch, time or money. Fun, attractive, busy (but NOT pursuing) guy. Undid bad habits, tasks I had left undone for months or years, I cranked out.

I read lots of self-help/relationship books and tried to get myself a life apart from her with my kids. I did months of individual counseling both for support and for self-change.

I think all of the above helped to stop the momentum of her pulling away from me. She calmed down, less anger, stopped proceeding towards divorce, started to see me less as SATAN, starting contact me to have meals with her and the kids (or outings with her and the kids). But, she still was not taking a step back TOWARDS the R, towards 1-on-1 time with me. She was happy with limbo, not fully divorcing from me, but having me sort of around in her life. I could not live like that anymore, however.

In my opinion, what ultimately really turned things around or brought things to a head, were my trying to move on after all of the above -- a hard core form of last resort technique I suppose (and it wasn't a technique, it really was where I was at). I told her I respected her decision not to work on our marriage, that I would have preferred to work things out, but that I understood that is not what she wanted, and I would move on with my life accordingly. No anger, no threats, no pleading, just I accept this is what you want, I agree with you, and I will live my life accordingly, I will be putting my things into order to file for divorce. Then I said that I would only contact her in the context of emergency issues concerning the kids and I would only respond to her for same (not punitively, just because that's what I felt I needed to move on).

And I went full no contact and kept living my life.

For several weeks of this, there was no contact at all from her.

Then, I noticed she would try to initiate contact -- either a call or a text, or when we would be transferring the kids, she would try to make conversation. One time I went to get them and she started trying to give me all these things (gifts?) to take with me -- 'here I got you these beers at the store and here are some jelly beans and here are this and that and here take this). Through all of this, I kept trying to stick to my boundary of not contacting her unless for crisis kid issues.

After maybe a total of 2-3 months of this NC, I was going to my college reunion and was going to drop the kids off with her before I left. I noticed she had seemed different on the phone (like really warm?). When I got to her place to give her the kids, she said come here and gave me a genuine, warm hug and told me to 'be safe and be good' I wonder if the 'be good' comment meant she was scared I was going to go hook up with someone at the reunion. Anyway, while I was at reunion, she was constantly calling and texting me, and I would respond flirtingly to them. The week I got back, she called me from her work in tears saying she missed me, she missed all our good times and she wanted her old life back and how could we do that.

A wise guy told me fast is slow and slow is fast and was that ever true in my case. My W was not only angry at me, she had lost respect for and attraction to me. I had to eliminate those negative feelings and curry positive feelings, but to do so without pursuing her and driving her away. Ultimately, SHE felt the loss when I was no longer a significant part of her life. That led to her second-guessing her own decision. It wasn't me convincing her of anything. In the end, she was the one who suggested we get back together. She was the one who suggested we go on a date. She was the one who asked me to find a therapist for us. The dynamic changed so that she was invested in the R and in me -- that she was beginning to pursue.

So:

1) Accept that you cannot control your partner, or her decision or her feelings or her actions. It's selfish to try and futile anyways.

2) Instead, respect your partner's decision -- if they say they are done, you're right the current situation isn't working for me either (I wouldn't want to share my W having an EA, right?) I accept that you are done, I will live my life accordingly (i.e., give them all the space they want and more, get your own life going, get out there and enjoy what you can, distract yourself until you genuinely enjoy it)

3) Recognize your faults in the R, own them, fix them, live them

4) Recognize your value, enhance it, flaunt it, ooze it

It's not up to you whether she comes back or not. It's her choice to come back or not, but try not to put your focus on that. Put your focus on bettering yourself as an individual and in relationships. On living the best life you can. You will succeed that way no matter her choice.
_________________________

[SunnyB]

Jefe, how was your weekend?

[CaliGuy]

Labug .. amazing post ... one I think many of us need to read/live. Thank you for a little shot in the arm ... and yeah Jefe .. I think you needed this one too.

Just a suggestion ... New Years .. I am telling you now .. find a spot for the kids, go out and do your own thing .. She will be and you are going to let it eat at you ... DON'T!!

GAL my friend ... you must do this its the only way you will detach ... she knows you are holding the rope and she will do whatever she likes ... you have to start doing your own thing.

[Jefe]

It was good, RPP. Thank you for asking.

Labug, thank you for the post. I went back and read a little of his threads I need to delve a little deeper.

CG, it's already gnawing at me. I'll get to work on some plans. May have to, to stay sane.


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