WAW OR TOUGH LOVE HELP

[SMXL5]

I decided to let the wife come back and spend the night after NC for 2.5 weeks. She went ballistic when she saw I moved her stuff in the basement. Told me if I didn’t put her stuff back she’d move back in, LOL. As I said I moved them because it was painful to look at her stuff around the house, especially the bedroom. She wanted to stay at her friend’s house and also stay at this one whenever she felt like it. Legally I guess I can’t stop her but I don’t understand why she’d want to. Dinner with S25 and S18 was tense and going downhill fast. She said she was going to leave early in the morning and started packing more stuff to take from the basement to her car. I gladly helped her. I thought she missed us and wanted to see us but now I think she had to be out of the place she was staying at last night. I had nothing to lose so I decided to confront her about OM, I told her I drove by the hairdresser’s house and saw the other guy’s car there. I didn’t do that the hairdresser told me but I didn’t want her to get in trouble. She said,” I’m not allowed to have friends?”

[SMXL5]

Morning comes and she’s up early packing more stuff. She’s even more ballistic so I decide to push about OM at hairdresser as I think she’ll slip up. I said “How’d you like to be his wife?” Her, “How do you know he’s married?” At this point I can tell the affair is confirmed. Her, “I know you cheated on me, I have proof.” She has no proof I never cheated, but I realize she is saying this to justify her affair. If I wasn’t sure about the affair before, I am now. I don’t know how everyone else does this, the insanity of it all. If I could push a button and never see her again I would do it and that’s after calming down. She leaves at 8:30 am but not before parting shots. I go upstairs to my bedroom and discover my iPad is missing. I have it set to erase after 10 password tries but I change my email passwords anyway. I’ll be happy to go dark for a while and get some peace and quiet. Anyone else with a rebellious teenager?

[Flight]

Lol, rebellious teenager. I say the same thing. She goes between that and angry 4 year old most of the time with flashes of the girl I married when she gets emotionally tired and lets her wall down.

ILYBNILWY, I made changes but they were, “too late,” In fact it made her mad that I didn’t do it sooner Everything was my fault, the marriage of 33 years had nothing good about it, 33 years and nothing.

So classic. Again all this stuff is textbook and word for word, just like her projecting the cheating onto you and miniming "I'm not allowed to have friends?" You will probably get you are smothering her and are insecure as well.

Sometimes, I do think the healthy thing is to cut them out of your life completely. They behave selfish and nasty during this period. If they came out of it and you could show them a greatest hits video of their BS, they would wonder how they could go against everything they say they stand for (honesty, treating others with respect, being a good christian, etc). All I do know is you can't react to her comments and transferring blame to you. You can do whatever you want with her clothes and don't have to explain yoursel. And you probably should 180 on the OM. (don't mention him, don't spy) It just hurts you and will inflame her. "You have no right to invade my privacy!" "You are sick, now I know I made the right choice to leave you!"

[SMXL5]

Hi Flight, Thanks for reading my rant. I did make a lot of mistakes in the beginning but then I did try my best to follow the books. I kept journals on what was and was not working, when was the best times to talk to her, usually after I fed her. She just kept drifting away and every once in a while would give me hope. Whenever I said enough is enough she’d say, “Just when I was going to give you another chance.” I told her I was done in June and she said if I could make to September she’d give me another chance (again! Lol). One night away became two then three and now five, when I heard about OM from hairdresser that was enough disrespect for me.

I let her come back after two weeks as I knew she either missed us or she was looking for a fight. It was a fight so she could continue with her bad behavior and I bit the hook. I have to do a 180 on OM as she left today and I will not contact her, I will go dark and re-read the books. I’m hurting but glad I found out about OM, it makes it easier to GAL and move on, I hope. I think she didn’t like losing the control she had over me and that’s what made her mad not the moving of the clothes. On the way out the door she said, “That was your last chance!” (I wish I had a dollar for every time I hear that one) So you’re correct Flight, she had no choice but to leave me and be adulterous, what else could she do? Going to watch a comedy movie with my sons and salvage the day.

[Flight]

I really laughed about the best time to talk to her being "after I fed her". Not to generalize women, but my experience is their moods are more sensitive to being hungry or tired than men. I also learned to make sure that those to things were tended to or run away! Hate you had such a bad day. Hope spending time with your kids ended it on a hight note.

[SMXL5]

I feel terrible for the way we parted yesterday. We were both in a rage and I should have known better not to engage her. She just admitted to OM and that didn’t help much either. I wonder if she had just come to me in the beginning and said there was somebody else if that would have made a difference or if we had been separated or had filed for divorce. I’ve spent the day on the verge of tears thinking of all we’ve lost. I always wondered how I feel if I found out about an OM well now I know. I feel so betrayed. All she had done over the last year has just been totally out of character for her. Even though this is killing me, at the end of the evening here I was thinking about sending her an email and apologizing for how we parted. I’m not thinking straight so it a bad idea?

[Flight]

Did you send an email? My counselor gave me great advice, always sleep on it and if it is time cricical, it can surely wait an hour while you think about it. Not sure if an apology in that case is a bad idea. You can apologize for what you feel what your part in it. Test it out and see if it works or doesn't then remember that. I found it took a long time for me to develop tactics to not get triggered emotionally. I tried a rubber band around my wrist that I could snap, but she saw me doing it once and it irritated her Then I learned to just stop. I developed this mechanism of freezing when I heard something upsetting. After I freeze, I take two breaths with no thinking. Then I process what I heard and decide if I need to respond or say, "I need to go and think right now about what was said. We can talk later". You cannot affor to get angry or argue, ever. THAT is your first challenge. Make it a game where you track how well you do. "Only 1 argument out of 10 triggers this week!"

[SMXL5]

I slept on it and sent a text this morning that said, “I feel bad for the way we left things. I was hurting like never before and I wanted you to feel my pain. So sorry.” I can’t believe it was all over moving her clothes but she never let up all Fri evening. I said I’ll move them back etc. and just more spew, Sat morning was even bigger anger and spew and then I pushed her about OM. Her, “I know you’ve had an affair on me and I have proof!” She has no proof I never have and I realized she was in an affair and I was getting the blame. I was devastated. I feel we should have been legally separated or divorced first and not behind my back.

If I had to guess about the clothes I think she was shocked to see that I was trying to move on. Now that I’m detached a little more I can see I was putting up with her staying out 1 then 3 and recently 5 nights a week so why would I change? She was getting bolder with staying out and had gotten bolder with OM by bringing him to a place we both go to and where the owner is my friend. Maybe she wanted to get caught IDK. S25 said he can’t look at her in the eye and that was before the affair. You could say I was a horrible husband (I’m no saint) but since she turned 50 she’s cut out of her life her brothers, her parents except for mother’s day and Xmas and now 2 years later our family. The apology text was more for me than her I don’t approve of what she is doing.

[SMXL5]

I got a text back from her this afternoon that said she accepted my apology and she knew I was hurting. She went on to say that maybe we could work towards having “discussions” without hurting each other. I’m guessing “conversations” are out of the question. No mention of her vile spew but I wasn’t looking for that. My apology was to correct my wrong.

In the evening I forced myself to go to the gym and was surprised that I had such a great workout. On the way out I pressed the button to open the glass doors and it was like the gym changed from our gym to my gym and I was going home to my house. It was truly magical and I finally felt a little bit what GAL and detachment was like.

[dwh15]

It is a very liberating feeling when you do start to experience those detached moments. I've had a few myself, but don't expect it to last long at first. I was great yesterday, then back to feeling depressed today. It's a process, and is going to take a while, but the good news is you do seem to be making progress. Enjoy the positive days, fight through the bad ones, and keep moving on.