My husband was also a faithful Muslim man until he declared he became an Atheist simultaneously when he walked away from our marriage. It's so odd that a good spouse who has followed their faith most of their life can suddenly flip a switch like that!
When I spoke with a lawyer and a called a mediator in January neither specified whether it's better to start the process sooner or later. Perhaps sooner is better if you've already reached the point where you can envision moving on and if a year has already passed since BD and there's been no real progress towards reconciling. I can also say that now for myself after six months has passed since the divorce announcement and we're neither reconciled nor divorced that staying in limbo isn't terribly great either.
I do hope your wife will wake up and save herself and realize what she's done. It'll be too bad if that happens after divorce, especially if you no longer want her back in the future. I wish there'd be some way to prevent these situations from happening. Most of us never expected this so how could we have known?
My husband was also a faithful Muslim man until he declared he became an Atheist simultaneously when he walked away from our marriage. It's so odd that a good spouse who has followed their faith most of their life can suddenly flip a switch like that!
Nicole, this just proves that a lot of this has to do with lost family values and often with lost faith. And it also proves that it's a crisis that the WAS/Midlifer faces that is much bigger than the marriage. It's about the meaning of life. For me, because I believe strongly in God, the loss of faith is much more serious than the loss of the marriage.
By the way, I am not saying that people who don't believe in God cannot have successful marriages. I'm just talking about what I know. I always believed in God, so I cannot speak for those who don't believe.
Originally Posted by NicoleR
When I spoke with a lawyer and a called a mediator in January neither specified whether it's better to start the process sooner or later. Perhaps sooner is better if you've already reached the point where you can envision moving on and if a year has already passed since BD and there's been no real progress towards reconciling. I can also say that now for myself after six months has passed since the divorce announcement and we're neither reconciled nor divorced that staying in limbo isn't terribly great either.
I think the main reason the lawyer gave me that advise was a pure financial one because I earn much more than my wife and I will have to pay her spousal support in addition to child support and splitting our assets. The more we delay the D, the more I keep paying her bills without an agreement and I continue accumulating savings and assets that will have to be split.
I'll give you an example: I am paying $2,000 mortgage payment every month. If we stay in this limbo state for 2 years before finalizing the D, I would have paid $48,000 mortgage payments to the home. At D, the value of our home will be split by 2. This means that during these 2 years, I gave her half of the $48,000 unnecessarily.
It's all about the agreed separation date during mediation negotiations. The partner that earns more will want the earliest separation date as possible. The other partner will try to get the latest separation date as possible. If both partners earn similar incomes, it probably doesn't matter financially.
Originally Posted by NicoleR
I do hope your wife will wake up and save herself and realize what she's done. It'll be too bad if that happens after divorce, especially if you no longer want her back in the future. I wish there'd be some way to prevent these situations from happening. Most of us never expected this so how could we have known?
Divorce is just a piece of paper. If all the right factors are there for a reconciliation, this can be done after D. At this point of my marriage, any R will be a re-marriage anyway. From reading your story, it's the same thing for you.
Me:49 XW:41, M:18 years, Kids: S18,S14 BD:JULY 2017, W moved out: DEC 2017 Filed for D: APR 2019, D Final: JULY 2019
Kiro, it makes perfect sense to do it sooner since you earn more. You didn't want this so you don't need to do your wife any favors financially. You won't leave her on the street but financially you need to do what's in your best interest and your kids' interest as well. I guess that's why divorce needs to be approached with a business mind and without emotions. Yes there can always be a reconciliation after divorce or right before the divorce papers are about to be signed. My own husband was talking about getting re-married in a few years. Apparently it does happen. And even if reconciliation happens before divorce it's true, it's equal to a new marriage. As I wrote on my thread all the old hopes and dreams are gone so any reconciliation will be something totally new.
Kiro I think you have the loss of faith and morals backwards. Most WASs don't become so because they lost their faith and morals. They lose their faith and morals because they've become walk away.
My W was like that. She was a devout Christian woman. In December she was ready to throw that all aside to follow her waywardness. WASs, once they decide what they are going to do, strive to rid their lives of anythingand anyone that's contrary to that. This is discussed all the time on the board. WAS will cut out friends and family that try to tell them that what they are doing is wrong.
Remember most WAWs (not sure about WAHs) have been plotting their escape for two years prior to BD. That's a long time to come to grips with the setting aside of their long held values. By time BD hits they are ready to jettison any and all things contrary to that plan.
This why sandi stresses that she isn't the girl you married nor does she care about her prior beliefs and morals any longer. Because they don't align with her wayward mindset.
This is why trying to shame them into staying based on their previous values doesn't work. They simply don't care about that anymore. At least for right now.
M(53), W(54),D(19) M-23, T-25 Bomb Drop - Dec.23, 2017 Ring and Piecing since March 2018
Steve, that's a good point. But it doesn't change much IMO. It's like the chicken or the egg. Values/Faith keep us on 1 track. If we lose faith, we start looking at other paths. But it's also true that if we start getting tempted by other paths, we may end up questioning our faith or anything in order to do what we want. I think it's an ongoing duality and struggle within each of us.
A few months before BD, my W started talking a lot about feeling liberated. And you're right, in retrospect, she had started changing about 2 years before BD. She wasn't the same anymore and had started detaching and distancing herself.
Me:49 XW:41, M:18 years, Kids: S18,S14 BD:JULY 2017, W moved out: DEC 2017 Filed for D: APR 2019, D Final: JULY 2019
Steve, that's a good point. But it doesn't change much IMO. It's like the chicken or the egg. Values/Faith keep us on 1 track. If we lose faith, we start looking at other paths. But it's also true that if we start getting tempted by other paths, we may end up questioning our faith or anything in order to do what we want. I think it's an ongoing duality and struggle within each of us.
A few months before BD, my W started talking a lot about feeling liberated. And you're right, in retrospect, she had started changing about 2 years before BD. She wasn't the same anymore and had started detaching and distancing herself.
This is very common kiro. I agree it is a bit of a chicken and the egg, except that the temptation if you think her losing faith caused her to walkaway, then convincing her of her faith will bring her back. It is very dangerous thinking.
DBing might wake her up. It might not. I like you was more concerned about my W's soul than our marriage. But it was walking away and waywardness that made her lose her faith, not the other way around. The only way I could potentially get her to recommit to God was through doing the DB work. If she could wake up to the reality of walking away then she could potentially wake up to the reality that she had wandered away from God.
But shaming or guilting her through her lack of faith was never going to work!
M(53), W(54),D(19) M-23, T-25 Bomb Drop - Dec.23, 2017 Ring and Piecing since March 2018
[quote=kiro] This is very common kiro. I agree it is a bit of a chicken and the egg, except that the temptation if you think her losing faith caused her to walkaway, then convincing her of her faith will bring her back. It is very dangerous thinking.
DBing might wake her up. It might not. I like you was more concerned about my W's soul than our marriage. But it was walking away and waywardness that made her lose her faith, not the other way around. The only way I could potentially get her to recommit to God was through doing the DB work. If she could wake up to the reality of walking away then she could potentially wake up to the reality that she had wandered away from God.
But shaming or guilting her through her lack of faith was never going to work!
I never talked about shaming or "guilting" anyone. I see faith as something different than anything else in this world. For me, it is the essence of life. I don't want to transform this conversation into a religious or spiritual one. Making a shift from being a believer to a non-believer is huge.
But I also believe that faith is a personal choice. More than anything else in life, I don't think we can influence anyone else's choice to either choose to believe or not.
But I don't understand exactly what you are saying. If W first made the decision to walk away, and that giving up faith, values, family and friends to be able to achieve that goal, then maybe she is not that wayward after all. Maybe it's all about the relationship and this was her only way out. And maybe that after she manages to detach and start a new life, she will slowly get back to faith and to other people she pushed away.
Basically, I see the opposite of what you are saying. If she had lost faith first and that led her into temptation to sin and that led her to walk away, then if she decides to recommit to God, then she could start changing her behavior.
But if she decided to walk away first, then she could go back to God, without necessarily seeing anything wrong about walking away from the marriage.
Me:49 XW:41, M:18 years, Kids: S18,S14 BD:JULY 2017, W moved out: DEC 2017 Filed for D: APR 2019, D Final: JULY 2019
kiro, good, then I won't go into a long explanation.
Obviously the base problem is a lack of proper priorities. I, like you, see faith as a way of life. To give up my faith would be to give up my life (and that is literally in the spiritual sense).
But the WAS really has one goal. Her own happiness. You saw this with your own W, with her drawing herself as the center with the kids and everyone else around her! That is it in a nutshell.
Faith, family, friends, everything else goes out the window in their selfish pursuit of happiness.
kiro, and please understand that maybe there are cases where faith went first and then the WAS said "I was wrong about that so now I am free to go crazy." But I truly do believe the vast majority of cases is that they become wayward and/or walkaway first, and then cast off anything that doesn't fit that new world view.
M(53), W(54),D(19) M-23, T-25 Bomb Drop - Dec.23, 2017 Ring and Piecing since March 2018
I think that I live in the most liberal place in North America. Where I live, no one gets married anymore. And no one goes to church (or the equivalent). Churches are constantly converted to lofts or other purposes. Majority don’t believe in God. I’ve had visitors come from other North American regions and comment about how socially decadent it is in here. It’s heaven if you’re a teenager, but not when trying to build a stable family.
Me:49 XW:41, M:18 years, Kids: S18,S14 BD:JULY 2017, W moved out: DEC 2017 Filed for D: APR 2019, D Final: JULY 2019
