Nope, I guarantee I don't underestimate you.. You don't have your confidence, you don't believe you are worth more, you dont recognize the disrespect your WW has towards you..
Of that I'm sure, I was you, and I see it
M - 9 1/2 years 5/5/16 - Bomb drop - 3 week EA 10/31/16 - We sold house 01/10/18 - D Finalized
Dark humor. If you can't laugh at the suffering in the world then things would be too darn serious too much of the time.
It's like the guy who said "This is my fourth marriage and if this one doesn't work out I'm going to follow my friend's advise: Find a woman I hate every ten years and buy her a house"...
Me:38 XW:38 T:11 years M:8 years Kids: S14, D11, D7 BD/Move out day: 6/17/14, D final Dec 15
HJ...I have been out for a few days and just caught up with your thread. Just wanted to say I am sorry about your recent developments and wish you nothing but peace, strength and clarity. Take care.
Just popped in to check on the board and saw this thread right away. Hoosjim I am so sorry my man. But you seem like you are in a good place. Don't beat yourself up at all, you made your decisions based on what you knew at the time and your love for your wife.
I had a conversation several weeks ago with my wife, before she started showing signs of letting go of her waywardness and moving back towards committing to the marriage. I told her near the end of it: "I really do love you." This was said in a way as to NOT expect an "I love you too" back. That was not my intent. Her response was: "I know you do. Otherwise you would have kicked me to the curb already."
I am sure some of our SMEs here will say that was a sign that she was still manipulating me. Admitting to using that love to her advantage. And maybe it was. But it also showed that my decisions to change for the better, based on my love for her, had an impact on her. That she could see my actions were saying I loved her, and it wasn't just empty words they way they seemed before.
Hoosjim, I think you still have the hope of R. I really do. I think the changes in you have had an affect on your W. Sure she gave in to the OM's advances (at least that is what I think from what I could piece back together), but As are hard to end until one of the participants is ready to end it. I know I watched my childhood friend go through an awful depression when her AP ended their A. That was 10 years ago, and she just now in the last 2 years finally go completely over him.
I remember a few year ago (3 or 4) her telling me she hated him. I said to her: "Then you are not over him. When you feel nothing for him THAT is when you will know you are over him."
She admitted me to me a few months ago that she now felt nothing for him except maybe a little pity.
Know that I am praying for you guys. I hope that it can all work out for the best.
M(53), W(54),D(19) M-23, T-25 Bomb Drop - Dec.23, 2017 Ring and Piecing since March 2018
Jim, you've gotten some great advice, and I KNOW how hard it is to follow the advice sometimes when your heart is telling you something else. But our hearts are often at odds with good DB'ing.
When we tell you that you need to separate, it's not because we don't believe in saving marriages, it's because most of us see that as the only chance you have at recon. You argued that there is a lot of data supporting in-house S working, but if there is I haven't seen it. The only story on these forums I can think of where a truly wayward wife reconned while under the same roof was TXHubby, but if you've read his sitch he let her control and manipulate him for months just like your W is doing and all it got him was stressed to the point where he couldn't function and thought he might die of a heart attack. It wasn't until he woke up and said "screw this, I am not letting her make me miserable for one more minute" and truly detached and moved on that she woke up to what she was losing. For all intents and purposes they might as well have not been under the same roof, because he had NOTHING to do with her after his awakening.
When I read that stuff your W is writing, I can't help but think "wow I wish my ex had written me stuff like that!" Because we all want our spouses to own what they've done and beg for forgiveness, so on the face of it it sounds like the right thing is happening. The problem is your W is oh-so-quick to do it... only after getting caught. It's pretty clear she's just strictly in damage control mode. She's like "oh crap I got caught, I need to do a little old-fashioned hoosjim controlling and manipulating to get him back in line and then I can pick up where I left off." So I think what most of us are telling you is that you have to break out of that pattern and quit playing into her hands. And not just for a couple of days. You've got to completely separate and detach and leave her to the disaster she's made, and do it for months or even a year or more before you can expect her to come to you with a truly humble spirit.
I've said this before on your thread and I'll say it again - an in-house separation will kill your mind, body, and soul.
I had an in-house separation that lasted for about 8ish weeks. I thought I could handle it. I even suggested to W that we live in separate bedrooms and make this separation work so that we could keep the marital house. I was super naieve when I suggested that.
I can tell you that those 8 weeks in-house S were absolute mental torture for me. I was unable to get some grounding and it was just so emotionally destabilizing to see her every day and be reminded of the situation. I kept replaying the past over and over again and trying to find how I could make this better and get her back. She was there physically, just within my reach I thought, but in reality she was a million miles away.
I have seen you use the 'everyone's sitch is different' line of argument to basically dismiss someone's perspective because you didn't like it. You don't have to like my perspective either, but I am one of many who have gone through some in-house S and wished we had just separated fully right when BD happened.
I am going to highlight some of the benefits of being physically separated for me:
1. Achieving mental and emotional grounding, and ability to process my emotions in a new neutral environment and space. 2. Able to recalibrate my goals and being processes to achieve them. 3. Able to objectively look at the MR and truly understand where I was unhappy and how it came to be that way, which allowed to identify areas for improvement just so that I could round myself out as a better man 4. Able to truly be in a process of detachment. 5. Come to terms and even looking forward to my life without W in the picture - envisioning happiness and contentment
I used to think that TxHubby was a great example of an in-house S gone well, but Sandi has repeatedly explained how TxHubby's sitch was not an in-house S, and it makes sense now.
My only contribution to your thread would be about this decision. I would highly recommend that you think about fully separating and moving forward with your life. If artista's timeline is any indication, you're looking at years for possible recon and piecing.
Get out and live your life! If she comes back and it's true, then that will be a bridge to cross in the future.
