Hoosjim's 9th: WW, A ended(?); "All-in" or not?

[hoosjim]

Hi Artista, thanks for the input. Two things:

he knew for months before he confronted me... that was a big mistake... if he had confronted me early on, i would not have become so engrossed in the A... by the time he confronted me, i was fully in it... much too deep... by then it had become a compulsion...

I dont mind other people's sitch's bleeding over into my threads... its just another way we can learn from each other. I will throw my two cents in here: I made this VERY same mistake. I was aware of the A for a long time... almost four months... before i acted to "put my foot down" (and even then did a pretty crappy job of it at first). I allowed myself, in my confused, devastated, and weakened state, to rely on a friend who, while he loved me like brother, gave me very bad advice, advice which i took and which basically amounted to allowing my W to continue in her EA without objection. From everything i have since learned from multiple sources/places, that time allowed what was at the time a VERY early stage EA... perhaps only a strong friendship that was just starting to cross the line from my W's standpoint... to grow and morph into a full-fledged obsession. In January at BD it was definitively NOT a PA, and much more friendly and chatty than hot and passionate. By the time i collected my wits, regained my self-confidence, etc., my wife's talks with OM had gone from "I do kind of like you, but even if we ever got together it couldn't be for a very long time from now" with no explicit talk of sex to a tear-filled "I just want to jump on you and run away with you" as well as fairly explicit discussion of what they both enjoyed sexually and could do to each other. There was a span of time, there, a few weeks maybe after BD, where she distanced herself from OM and where, had i been firm at all about it, i probably could have ended the A. Then, something happened. Don't know exactly what. A party or night out with that crowd, involving her BFF, and the candle was re-lit.

None of that is to say, of course, that ending the A at that point would have been a magical elixar to fix my MR. Far from it. At that point my GAL's and 180s had scarcely started to kick in. Not even sure W and I were considered friends at that point. BUT... I gotta think it still might have created an opening to start working from firmer ground. Now, she has a "love affair" to get over... if she ever does. Not honestly sure I am prepared to wait around for two years, Artista, as your H did for you. I'll be 52 in April, have a resurgent libido (for a number of reasons, including medical) and haven't had sex in a LONG time.

but when Holding questions you about her avoiding communion, because he sees it as something telling, you back pedal and kind of brush it off as though it really isn't that big of a deal, it really isn't something new... you do this a lot...

I appreciate your insight, but... This is something i have intimated before and i am going to take a stand on it because it is important to me and something that really, really gets under my skin at times: Reputations are often earned and hard to change or shake, BUT... very few things annoy me more than reputational bias. I had a friend from college who used to do this endlessly to me-- i had a well-earned reputation as a mooch and freeloader in my late teens through early college but changed when I realized i was endangering and even losing friendships as a result-- but he would trot it out in ANY situation where something was missing or the tab at the bar was short: "Must have been hoosjim, he always does that". INFURIATES me.

So, do i have a well-earned reputation here for "backtracking", even "revisionism" WRT my wife's actions? Perhaps. I can certainly go back and see multiple places where i have done this. But please please please PLEASE try to read my posts in their entirety, and in the context of the surrounding posts, before lobbing that grenade at me, Okay? Have i done that in the past? Yes. Did i do it here? Absolutely not, and I am going to repeat something i posted earlier here and which i consider a bedrock principle and which I will not abandon: Facts and context both matter, and I have a fairly low tolerance for sloppy interpretation or relation of either or both... not to the point of attacking other posters, but definitely to the point of correcting misperceptions.

In this case, THAT's what was going on in my post. The context in which I related her skipping communion very much made it appear that it was a "lately" thing, if you read that post. In fact, i don't think that there is any other way you can take what i posted. Holder, quite reasonably in that context, said that that "This is a big sign of something in my eyes. Has she ever not accepted communion in the past?" My response in no way indicated that i though that it was not a big deal, in fact I believe i said that she must realize that "She really effed up" or else was in rebillion against her faith. Rather, i indicated that that was nothing NEW... that she had been skipping communion since at least the time of BD, and possibly before and, therefore, was not necessarily indicative of anything "new" going on. Not sure if you're catholic or familiar with the faith, but if she has sinned sufficiently she can't go back and take communion until she has had a valid "confession" with a priest... which I noted she also had not done-- also important context for Holding, who apparently is familiar with the faith as well. (And good luck with knowing when she goes to confession for the A-- she got pregnant at 18, the first time she ever had sex, and underwent an abortion in college and it took her I think she said almost three years to get up the courage to go to confession, so reluctant was she to face that guilt.)

So, in sum,if i am being revisionist or "backtracking", by all means call me on it. In this case, the "new" information is that she has been skipping mass more than in the past and appears uncomfortable in church (whether from guilt or from the discomfort of having to hug me during the sign of peace or from increasing frustration with our tourretic son-- which has always stressed her out in church-- is unknown). The skipping communion, which i led Holding to believe was a current phenomenon, and something new to be considered, is neither new nor discounted in my head. I am pretty much 100% sure the A and her failure to go to confession for it is the reason she hasn't been going... but I have "known" that for months, now.

I hope I'm being clear here. Just... don't pull the "backtracking" or "revisionist" card on me when i am merely correcting facts or clear misconceptions.

[doodler]

I don't understand.

[joejoe1]

Jim,

I'm lost on your last post. Are you really trying to correct people about your W taking communion? You seem frustrated. I haven't seen you so defensive.

You have defended your W actions but Jim, I think you know what Artista was trying to tell you and it wasn't just about no communion. She was pointing out your defensiveness. And I must tell if it shows up here, how do your W perceive it. You ask for help then try to defend all kind actions your W does and seem to get offended by advice given.

But, no matter what we are here for you.

We all want to see you happy! We all want what you want to see you enjoy some sex! You deserve it.

[joejoe1]

Jim,

I'm lost on your last post. Are you really trying to correct people about your W taking communion? You seem frustrated. I haven't seen you so defensive.

You have defended your W actions but Jim, I think you know what Artista was trying to tell you and it wasn't just about no communion. She was pointing out your defensiveness. And I must tell if it shows up here, how do your W perceive it. You ask for help then try to defend all kind actions your W does and seem to get offended by advice given.

But, no matter what we are here for you.

We all want to see you happy! We all want what you want to see you enjoy some sex! You deserve it.

[hoosjim]

I haven't seen you so defensive.

ARRRGGGHHH! (Yes, I actually screamed.) I hate being called "defensive". It is, IMHO, about the most passive-aggressive manner in which you can characterize someone, basically implying "youre wrong and you know it" or "you have something to hide." Or, perhaps, you just like throwing the term "defensive" around because you have nothing substantive to say to bolster your own position. (Yes, yes, I am in fact a lawyer, by both training and avocation ) And, other than that very brief correction of MY OWN mis-statement(and this is not subject to any kind of dispute... it was a misstatement... the facts are the facts are the facts) I didn't see anything in my post even remotely defensive and, given what i was trying to say in those couple of sentences, I think it's a pretty fair stretch to say that even THAT was being defensive.

And i thought that that was a pretty non-frustrated sounding post. Artista has not been around the forums all that long, does not know my history, and I am really trying to be a "kinder and gentler" hoosjim. I was really not all that frustrated, at least not specifically at her.

And i wasn't trying to correct ANYBODY but myself, okay? The fact of my wife taking or not taking communion and her history thereof, as well as the time frame within which my wife was or was not taking communion is VERY pertinent information, as Holding correctly noted. As such, for me to imply-- STRONGLY imply, if you look at my original post-- that that was a recent phenomenon-- is a gross mistatement of the pertinent facts (upon which Holding relied) which needed to be corrected. That is all. I was not trying to paint my wife as a saint or anything, just trying to make sure that we are all reading from the same sheet of music (and that the notes are the correct notes, if you take my meaning. Please read and re-read my post if necessary

Maybe im making this too complicated:

1) My wife cheated on me.
2) My wife is Catholic
3) My wife stopped taking communion shortly after she cheated on me (about 11 months ago)
4) I stated that my wife only very recently had stopped taking communion.
5) What I stated in "4" was inaccurate.
6) I don't like sloppy accounts of the facts, and I gave a very sloppy account of the facts.

That's it. That's all i meant to say about that otherwise relatively inconsequential event (my misstatement, not my wife's practitioning or lack thereof of her faith).

That, and please don't brand me as a revisionist, or defensive, or backtracking EVERY time i correct the factual record. Because that's not always what i'm doing. And recently more often than not Its not what im doing.

And I am not angry at any particular person, nor am i even really "angry"... just asking for some consideration of "the way i like things". which is, to say, factually sound. Even "religiously" so.

[hoosjim]

Okay, so I re-read my post to Artista, and it does sound more frustrated than I intended. I hate the internet and texting and email and message boards that deprive you of inflection and tone and body language... Had I been speaking it to her it would have sounded much less frustrated.

So, Artista, I apologize for my tone-- I could have done more to soften the tone of the post for sure. I just was trying to post a plea to not knee-jerk assume I am backtracking/revisionism-ing/defending-my-wife... Sometimes i am genuinely just trying to correct factual misconceptions or statements (and this time an actual mis-statement by me.)

JoeJoe... i did mean to scream at you. I do hate being called "defensive."

Okay, so I'm sorry to you, too...

[hoosjim]

Oh, so now she's come upstairs. After appearing to be out for the count on downstairs sofa again.

I'm willing to bet, though, that it's only because I said something about it this time...

[joejoe1]

Jim,

Its ok. Ive been screamed at plenty of times I'm a soldier.

[hoosjim]

I just can't frikking do this anymore.

After being off here for a week, rhinking things are sounding like maybe they were going a little better, last night my mind just started spinning like it hadn't in a while. Awake til almost 3.

Why my W's reconnection with bff after a bit of a layoff? Why is she all of a sudden sleeping on couch 4 of last 6 nights? She's still talking about rebelliousness. And where did this silver necklace she's wearing come from. It showed up about two weeks ago? About the exact same time she went for dinner and a couple drinks with bff. Is it normal for a woman to wear a necklace everywhere, even to bed, for two straight weeks? Why did she stop at Starbucks on way to work yesterday, and what and with who was her conference call with bff for 20 mins in car yesterday... a day after she'd had a two hour brunch supposedly with bff? (Yes, I started spinning and checked phone records.)

I just can't go into this cycle again. It's tearing me up.

[hoosjim]

I'm gonna bring all this up at MC tomortow. And the "all in" and we're working towards sex or we're not working at all bit.

It's just too hard.