Life 2.0 Pt 3

[NH115]

JCred had a great post that I didn't see until after pt 2 thread locked. It's thought-provoking. Feedback from vets would be appreciated.

For me the boundary would be "wanting to see him"
I don't see much difference in her seeing OM and her wanting to see OM. Either way he is in your marriage.

I believe love works best when it is freely given. She feels suffocated which proves she doesn't feel she is free to give it...

I'm sick of loneliness, of fear, of analyzing every damn thing she does or says. I want warmth again. She's outwardly warm most of the time, but I know she's not really all there. I want to spend my time with a woman who doesn't look at me as her obstacle to happiness.

Maybe I'm trying too hard. Maybe I should just let go and let God.

Sometimes if you want to see a change for the better, you have to take things into your own hands - Clint Eastwood

Would someone please remind me why I'm fighting so hard? It's obvious she has no intention of respecting my boundaries.

Why are you fighting so hard? Seems to me that those who are most successful are the ones who stop fighting and let go.. What say you?

Am I fighting because I want to stay married to her, or because I'm afraid of having my world change? I honestly don't know anymore.

I don't hate her. I can't. I'll always love her. But I'm starting to wonder if she's not right; that too much time has passed and too much damage has been done to our marriage to repair. She's seething with resentment.

Maybe we really are keeping each other from being the people we want to be and being with the people we should be with. Maybe we were meant to be together for a while to have our children but not meant to be together for life.

I think it would be highly effective if you said those things to her. Why aren't you being honest with her? Maybe she is right.. She may even feel for the 1st time that you really ARE letting go....

You just can't force or pressure someone to love you. It works best when it is freely given.....

Take off the pressure.. This isn't really working for you.
Take your own Clint Eastwood advice.... Stop the force and let her go.. It will work much better when she comes back to you WILLING to do the things you are making her feel forced to do now...... Make it YOUR choice... Not mean or vindictive....

[JCred]

Feedback from vets would be appreciated.

I AM a vet....

[Wonka]

Rzr,

Don't apologize to W for D15's feelings toward her. D15 needed to get things off her chest and it's strictly between them. It's best that you stay away from them and allow them to figure out their relationship on their own. Frankly, I'm glad that your W is receiving some real raw insights on the pain and destruction she's caused to the whole family....not just you.

If and when W comments that she's not sorry about the OM, I would tell it straight to her that it is a very selfish thing to say and not accepting the responsibility for this horrible choice. I really do think this needs to be said to her face. You cannot afford to pussy foot around this issue.

What do really have to lose here? Other than your balls??

[NH115]

Rzr,

Don't apologize to W for D15's feelings toward her. D15 needed to get things off her chest and it's strictly between them. It's best that you stay away from them and allow them to figure out their relationship on their own. Frankly, I'm glad that your W is receiving some real raw insights on the pain and destruction she's caused to the whole family....not just you.

If and when W comments that she's not sorry about the OM, I would tell it straight to her that it is a very selfish thing to say and not accepting the responsibility for this horrible choice. I really do think this needs to be said to her face. You cannot afford to pussy foot around this issue.

What do really have to lose here? Other than your balls??

This is true. I'm glad that D15 is letting her have it. I took D15 to her room to talk, not to discipline but to comfort. I keep hoping that her children will get through to her in ways I'll never be able to. I just told W that D15 is entitled to her opinion.

Oh, I tell her all the time that she's solely responsible for OM. I get it thrown back at me that it's my fault she was vulnerable. I just walk away. My BS tolerance is getting extremely low.

It was interesting that one minute W was in the kitchen crying about her broken family (which she did absolutely NOTHING to cause of course ). Ten minutes later she and D10 are baking cookies and dancing to Billy Idol.

yank and bank.

Just had a talk with D15 and W; W is crying, not angry...sometimes I think that D15 might, just might, have an impact on her. D15 made the comparison about how calm and easy to deal with I am versus how not-calm my W is.

I'm just letting W stew on that a bit. Reality sandwich perhaps? Let's hope.

[Wonka]

Rzr,

Oh, I tell her all the time that she's solely responsible for OM. I get it thrown back at me that it's my fault she was vulnerable. I just walk away. My BS tolerance is getting extremely low..

The next time she pulls this line, calmly say:

W, we both know that's not true. Don't try to shift blame on other people for your choices. I am NOT responsible for your affair. You made that choice with your eye wide open. And you know it. This nonsense stops right now. Just so we're clear on this. I'm done talking about this issue. It's not cool with me standing right in front of you as your H.

Then walk away.

[JCred]

Oh, I tell her all the time that she's solely responsible for OM. I get it thrown back at me that it's my fault she was vulnerable. I just walk away. My BS tolerance is getting extremely low.

So, my question to you is how is that working for you?
You say that you tell her all the time and then it gets then it gets thrown back at you..

I would venture to say that isn't working too well for you, would you agree?

Dbusting says STOP doing what doesn't work. The more you tell her she is selfish, the more she will defend her position. Same as most people. Isn't she allowed to be selfish? Can you force her or pressure her to not be selfish?

Again.. Pressure, criticism and force don't seem to be working...

What works? LET THEM BE FREE....

Confident, happy, emotionally strong men are attractive to women. You don't seem to be showing those traits to me. You are pursuing her, pressuring her, arguing with her, calling her selfish... How many women do you know that are attracted to those types of men?


You need to focus on YOUR part here......


If it was me.......

Wife, I have been doing some thinking and I have decided that this isn't going to work for me. I finally get it. You have feelings for the OM. That doesn't work for me anymore. In the last few weeks I have come to the realization that I am not sure why I have been fighting so hard. Maybe you have been right all along that we aren't meant to be. I know that I am not interested in being with a woman that I suspect wants to be with someone else. I don't know what I must have been thinking.

I have now decided that I am not going to stop you from seeing OM. I have also decided that we should separate. I won't do this anymore.

[JCred]

The next time she pulls this line, calmly say:

W, we both know that's not true. Don't try to shift blame on other people for your choices. I am NOT responsible for your affair. You made that choice with your eye wide open. And you know it. This nonsense stops right now. Just so we're clear on this. I'm done talking about this issue. It's not cool with me standing right in front of you as your H.

Then walk away.

With all due respect to Wonka...


Please do not say this. You aren't the warden here.
There are far more effective ways to be a strong, confident, emotionally stable man. Don't demand things. Demanding is pressure. The best way I have found to stop these things is to set them free. Firm, confident and decisive... "I have decided that this isn't working for me"....

See the difference? Also works far better because it takes off any and all pressure for them to "be" a certain way.. If she believes it is your fault she had an affair,,, so be it, tell her that you have decided this isn't working for you..

See? End of conversation. She THEN has to either tell you she does want out (which is what you are scared of)OR..
She has to convince YOU why it will work.. (see the beauty in letting them go?) They either go or they have to show you why it will work... A whole different dynamic takes place just by letting go.. Let go of the fear.. Maybe she will go. Her mind is not totally there now, so what are you out?
Don't demand. Don't pressure. You aren't the warden. You have your own faults and issues. Work on those...

[sandi2]

For me the boundary would be "wanting to see him"
I don't see much difference in her seeing OM and her wanting to see OM. Either way he is in your marriage.

Well there is a big difference!! You can't put a boundary on what runs through her head! What do you think the withdrawal is? That is what she is thinking and wanting. But having the strength to not act on it......is what counts. Every time she denies herself, the more she withdraws from the addiction. Same as with a drug. At first that is all the addict thinks about. You have to keep thinking of her as an addict. She will crave it, but give her credit if she does not cave under the pressure.

I believe love works best when it is freely given. She feels suffocated which proves she doesn't feel she is free to give it...

Oh good lord. Of course she feels smothered. That is why we told you to not crowd her. I want you to get this.......She is still a WAW in heart. She is trying to do the right thing by returning to her H, but her feelings have to have time to straighten out. It took four months of pretty intense withdrawal from my A, and i had help from this board. She doesn't have that much. Yet you are whining about her not freely giving you love? She is not the only one who is thinking about themselves.

I don't know what you expected. We tried to tell you. Things just don't fall back to normal in a few weeks. If you can't rixe this out, then you need to release her.

[JCred]

I believe love works best when it is freely given. She feels suffocated which proves she doesn't feel she is free to give it...

Sandi2,
This was my quote to RZR, not his quote.....

Well there is a big difference!! You can't put a boundary on what runs through her head! What do you think the withdrawal is? That is what she is thinking and wanting.

Maybe to the Wayward there is a big difference, but I certainly don't see a big difference in the pain the betrayed spouse feels. Either way they feel rejection, pain, hurt, sadness, etc....

My point is that a betrayed can't force her to love them back.
Here is what some well known professionals say about an addiction... Please note the parts in bold... lasting recovery, when it begins, quite often begins in the context of a crisis of sufficient magnitude to overwhelm the addict’s natural and well-entrenched aversion to recovery by an even greater fear such as the loss of an important relationship

So RZR's wife fear of losing him can OVERWHELM her to an even greater fear than the loss of OM, which it says is when LASTING RECOVERY begins....

I have seen this work again and again on this site.. People who came on here saying they were "addicted" to porn, video games, work and many other things that didn't change their ways until the loss of their spouse... Suddenly they would do ANYTHING to get a handle on the addiction... The motivator that made it stick is the fear of loss.

That's my point to RZR... Suddenly her "wanting" the OM wouldn't be in her vocabulary... He is just scared to let her go. What he is doing is working great for her, but he seems to be at the end of his rope. Many experts agree that there needs to be a MAJOR CRISIS for recovery to stick...

Such considerations help to explain the fact, well-known to professionals who deal with individuals suffering from serious addictions, that lasting recovery, when it begins, quite often begins in the context of a crisis of sufficient magnitude to overwhelm the addict’s natural and well-entrenched aversion to recovery by an even greater fear such as the loss of an important relationship, a job, health or freedom(the threat of jail for addiction-related offenses).

It is therefore not at all the case that alcoholics and addicts "have to want to get better" before recovery can commence, much less that they must "want to get better for themselves and not for someone else." For the addict’s double-mindedness makes such "pure" motivation all but impossible for the vast majority of addicts. Luckily for the addict, recovery is just as likely, perhaps even more likely if he is in effect marched at bayonet point in the direction of behaviors that are good for him and which he would therefore, owing to his addictive hedonic disorientation, normally avoid like the plague if only he were not afraid that by so doing he would incur an even more unpleasant consequence. For it is one of the many curious paradoxes of addiction and recovery that genuine and sincere motivation for recovery is a result of and not a prerequisite for recovery.

[NH115]

Just for clarity's sake, the quotes above are someone else's. Not mine.

I agree that you can't put a boundary on someone's feelings. If that were the case then I've cheated many times over. I've been clear about my boundaries regarding seeing OM, and my W, bless her, has decided to flip the middle finger at those boundaries and is demanding to see him anyway, less than 30 days from now. She swears that it's for "clarity" and not for sex, and that may be what's in her mind, but you can imagine how much stock I put in her promises right now.

D15's pain and fear is viewed by my W as an obstacle to her getting "clarity" with OM. Addiction is the best description there is.

I'm not planning on going anywhere yet, but I do have start asking when enough is enough. I want to jump into healing our marriage with both feet, but she's not there yet. I'm not sure she has the patience to stick around long enough to work through her withdrawal. If that's the case, so be it.