Trudging up hill

[Sara]

Retrouvaille, meaning rediscovery in French, is an organization with support from the Catholic church that holds weekend retreats around the world to help people heal their broken marriages. They have a website, http://www.retrouvaille.org. The program works by example. Couples who have experienced misery in their marriages present their stories. They sit in front of you, with occasional tears in their eyes, holding hands and giving each other support, telling you openly and honestly about their lives, what went wrong, and how they fixed it. Then they teach you a communication technique called Dialoguing and you practice doing dialogues with your spouse, in private. They give you questions to dialogue about. These questions help you and your spouse understand each other at a deeper level than you ever could by simply talking.

The initial program takes a weekend. You can do it in your home city or go somewhere else and make it a mini-vacation. There are follow-up sessions locally. These help you to continue the openness and understanding with each other. They teach concepts like, love is a decision. Or, marriage is like a building supported by four posts: love, commitment, trust, and forgiveness. If you break one of the posts, like trust, and forgiveness is weak, then the building comes crashing down. To rebuild the marriage, you must rebuild the four posts. The more I thought about it, the more I understood. To rebuild my marriage I had to forgive, and trust. I couldn't rebuild the marriage first and have those fill in later.

While it is sponsored by the Church, it is open to all. My husband and I are not Catholics, and we benefited tremendously from the experience. We did not find the presentations by the priest to be too slanted to Catholic doctrine. He was there to be of service to the Catholics in the room who wanted his services. We were told not to confess new things to each other -- the priest was there to take confessions. I found that interesting. They do not focus on the past, they focus on building a new future together.

[light switch]

Edie,
The truth is I have been on top of this fence and on both sides of it. Like my old counselor said a's need to be ended decisivly. From experience, if they are not they reapear even a year later.

Doesn't want a divorce. H said he loves me and doesn't want to live without me. BUT he also said that he loves OW. He said he cannot live a double life of lieing to me and seeing her. Loving two woman at once etc.

I just want the guarantee that he is really here for good and that 3 months from now I'm not going to go through this again. Have any of you ever experienced this?

He needs to make this decision. If he ends it he doesnt even need to speek w/her again, counselor said sometimes no words mean more. I am worried for you. Did he end it? If so how did he end it?

Retrouvaille does sound like a good start.

[ediemarie]

Sara - thank you so much!! That is extremely helpful...I don't know if I'm ready to do this work and I certainly don't know if he is either...I'll have to think/pray about it. Yesterday, I did put a call into the Retro weekend organizers - waiting for them to call me back...only time will tell.

Thank you for answering my question! I appreciate it!!

[ediemarie]

LS - first - I'm glad you had a great day yesterday! Keep hanging in there!!(((LS)))

In regard to my stich: did he end it? Well THAT is the million dollar question. He said he did. Keep in mind this is the story I am getting from him - who knows if he's telling the truth? Basically, he left our home on Friday night with OW. She took him back to her place (she is 36 and still lives with her Mom and Dad - they were away for the weekend) and they had sex. Now the significance of the sex is that according to H this was their first time. Up until now they have had an EA with PA but never fully had sex - did lots of other stuff - everything but that. So Friday, H decided that he did not want to be married to me. He sends her a text message to come and get him (his car died last week). She picks him up, they have sex and then he wakes up Saturday morning and tells her that he can't leave me. He doesn't want to be a divorced man. He told her that he's made a mistake and he has to fix his marriage.

Now, when I heard this story I immediately felt that I was being played - and I still do. I have requested all along that he quit his job (they work together). He has to - and he agrees. Before he even came back on Saturday he said that he and OW discussed who should quit (gag) and they agreed that he should be the one. Oh he is such a martyr ... ugh...

Anyway - I'm not happy. I want to walk. I feel like I'm being handed one lie after another. I'm tired.

At one point this weekend while he and I were talking about stuff, I told him that maybe he should just go make things work with her. We don't own a home, we have no kids, what's the point in this? I told him he should go - his response was UNBELIEVABLE - he said, "well, if I leave you to be with her, my relationship with her would be tainted. Our relationship just wouldn't be right." WTF? Hello? Was it ever right? Why do I get to be the one in the tainted relationship? Isn't our M tainted?

So, your guess is as good as mine LS - I have no idea if he REALLY ended it. If he quits his job that may be a sign that he is serious.

thanks for stopping by and caring! That helps so much!!!

EM

[Sara]

Edie,

Maybe the sex wasn't that good. All that build up, and then a disappointment. But he's not going to tell you that.

The decision of whether to stay married is yours to make. I would put the decision on hold until you do the Retrouvaille weekend. They will tell him that he has to cut off the other relationship. They are firm about that. And in your discussions you will know if you want to recommit to the marriage or not.

It really is a retreat where you get to know each other all over again. As we were going through the Retrouvaille process, I kept the thought in my head, "Can you fix a broken husband?" At first I thought the answer was no. But now I see that it really is yes.

You had a lot of years dating. Think back to the men you met. Do you think there is a man out there who will be better for you than your husband? My experience was that they all had problems or baggage. I decided to stick with what I know.

But this is for you to decide. And it doesn't have to be right away. I can tell you the Retrouvaille experience will clarify your thinking.

If you have questions about Retrouvaille, you can email me at [e-mail].

[ediemarie]

Sara - funny that you should say it wasn't good. He did comment that having sex with her was difficult - not emotionally - it just wasn't easy to accomplish. Guess she needs more practice? I don't know, it kinda made me think that he didn't completely enjoy the experience. I don't know how anyone could when they are cheating. But, what do I know about it??

Thank you for your encouragement. I'm finding it very difficult to be nice right now. My comments to him are down right nasty. I keep doing all the wrong things. I say the wrong things, act the wrong way.

I left this morning after he got up - I came to the library. I suggested that he read the section of DR that talks about infedelity. I left it on the kitchen table. I noted the section that says "if you are the one that is unfaitful" I'm hoping he will read it to gain an insight into what I am feeling/thinking. I really don't want him to necessarily take my comments to heart...I want him to hear my heart and how much it hurts - throwing barbs his way doesn't help, I should just be direct. I'm having such a difficult time being direct with him. It's almost like I'd rather hurt him than have him with me or have him understand me. I suppose this is just part of the rollercoaster ride part 2.

The next Retrouvaille weekend in our area is September 14th - I don't know if I'll be able to make it that long. Perhaps I should look for one in another area and travel to it...

Thanks for reading!
EM

[Sara]

I know how you feel. I think he does need to suffer consequences for his actions. So he should feel some anger. But you don't want to make it so much that you drive him further away. Difficult balance.

We read parts of the book After the Affair until we went to Retrouvaille. I think it's by Janis Springer, but I could be wrong about the author. It is good because it looks at the situation from the perspective of both the cheating spouse and the hurt spouse.

Retrouvaille will give you the chance to really express your feelings in vivid language. You could go to one in a different state and then do the post sessions in your hometown. But even waiting a month after the weekend for the post sessions will be difficult. The weekend is great. It stops you in your tracks and sets you in a new direction. But it isn't enough. You still need those other six sessions to work on forgiveness and rebuilding the marriage.

After the weekend I felt like an aquatic creature that had grown legs, but didn't quite know how to use them. The post sessions got us walking forward on dry land.

[ediemarie]

Gotcha - I was curious how the post session work if we were to attend out of town - hmm...I'll have to think about that.

[saffie]

edimarie,

I can only agree with Sara. I don't think it's a bad thing necessarily for your H to see you vent a bit at him - after all if you didn't would that not show that you didn't care? I went mad at my H and I made sure I heard the phone calls and saw the emails ending the A. I also made damn sure she knew that he and I were still intimate and that altho very emotional that side of things was as good as it had ever been. Guess what? Sex with her had not been a good F"(k - It had been absolutely lousy!!!!!

Sometimes you can be too understanding - just a thought

Saffie

[ediemarie]

Saffie - you are right and I'm understanding to a fault. I know that. I, at times, feel like I really fall for it. I want so badly to believe him that he can tell me a real whopper and I'll believe it.

Today turned out not to be so good - we ended up talking about R so much I'M sick of it - now that is way too much!

I have an appointment with a therapist tomorrow. I'm really hoping that she will be able to help me define some better goals and shed some light on our sitch. I wish H would come along, but he isn't interested and I'm not pushing it. It's enough that he has agreed to go to Retrovaille. Although after he read about it he said he was unsure if it would really help us. I told him that I think it would help me and if it helps me, it could help us. We'll see.

Well - that's about it. I'm tired and I've talked to much today.

Thank you to all that have stopped by and offered an opinion! I appreciate it!

EM