With All My Hopes and Dreams

[soldier]

Hello everyone.

I am brand new to posting in these forums but have read many posts already. So a bit about what is going on. I am 32 years old and my W is 31. We have been together for a bit over 12 years and married for 11 as of March. In the early years of our marriage I was in the military and we saw many hardships that a normal couple just starting out shouldn't have to. We both grew well beyond our years but we had each other and with that a high level of happiness. I was overseas quite a bit and this added strain but I never thought there was unhappiness.

I left the military 5 years ago with the advent of the birth of our D5 and it was a rough transition for me. All of the structure I had become accustom to over the last 7 years was gone and I had a strange since of freedom and didn't know really what to do with it. Money was tight and we were forced to move in with my father for the next 3 years so as to make ends meet while I rapidly went through college. With a new baby and me going to school more than full time and my W working it was a busy and stressful time. We fought quite a lot and they often got very bad. I finally finished college and immediately found a decent paying job. We were able to move out of my father’s place about 2 years ago and into a really nice house that was perfect for our family. I then got yet another job with a substantially large bump in pay and this took money issues completely off of the table. Over these last two years I felt that we had finally made it and our dreams where becoming reality.

Early March my W seemed out of sorts and I attempted to reach out to her as to what the issue was. She confessed that she was terribly unhappy with our marriage and she though that I had to have felt the same way. I told her that I did not feel that way at all and that I didn't realize that she felt this way. I asked her why this was coming up now when we finally had so many good things and she simply told me that it was for that reason that she was so scared. She felt that if she couldn't be happy here with no money problems and a wonderful house and two cars paid off then she didn't think she could ever feel happy (implying with me). I immediately started to do the things that I have now found out where the worst possible things to do. I began doing as much around the house as possible and followed her around constantly. I kept trying to reach out to her physically thinking that this might help. She regularly told me that “she was trying” but that she had a lot of dark emotions hanging around her and she had trouble feeling love for me. This in turn made me worry more so I tried harder.

March 22nd I started what I now know was the three days of misery for my W. I attempted to stay as close to her as possible. I constantly poured my heart out to her and told her how much this marriage meant to me and how I can change and would change. Everything seemed to fall on cold deaf ears. March 24th my emotions got the best of me and I began to snoop. I was going through some photos on her computer and found a photo of another man she worked with. I have been jealous of this man in the past because he and my wife seemed to be so close and he is younger and more attractive so when I saw this photo it hit me hard and my mind went overtime. In a fit of anger I ran into our bedroom and woke my W up asking her if there was OM in the picture. She hugged me and cried and said there has never been an OM and that she has no idea how that picture ever got there. The next morning I attempted to make up for my bad behavior with intimacy and she at first acted to be into it and OK with it but after a few short moments I looked at her face and her face was very sad as if in mourning some great loss and it stopped everything dead in its tracks. I finished getting ready, said goodbye and left for work.

March 25th my W called me mid-day from work to let me know that although she had been trying things just were not working and she wanted some space to think through things. She picked my daughter up early from school and left for her mother’s to stay for a while. I did not fight with her but instead said I understand. I told her I was scared as I didn't think that space would allow us to work on this marriage to which she replied that she was scared too and that was that. She was gone. She didn't take much from the house for her or my daughter as I have since found out that she had been stock piling needed stuff at her mother’s for some time so as to be ready if she felt she needed to make this move.

It has only been two weeks and I have had next to no communication with her up to this point (per her wishes). I still get to see my daughter via a make shift schedule that was outlined for me but I am at our beautiful house all alone most of the time. Before you all tell me how bad those last three days where towards my spouse, I have since bought DR and read it cover to cover. I have also printed off the famous Sandi2’s 37 Rules and have been re-reading them every night. I have started to work on myself through exercise and reverted back to a somewhat militant diet and workout plan. I am also working hard to GAL with a combination of going out with family and re-connecting with old war buddies on Facebook. I am even attempting to plan two out of state trips to see some of them in the near future.

I feel very left in the dark and confused. I am not sure what this space means for us but this action has opened my eyes to so many truths as to what my part has been in leading out marriage to this current state. I know it takes two but I had really abandoned my W in many ways and on all fronts such as physically, mentally, spiritually and emotionally. My W has helped me through so many things such as loss, war and general crisis. She has been a beacon for me and help to give me the strength and courage to become the man that I have become. I miss her greatly and although it is a bit easier at the two week mark, I still have many sleepless nights just thinking of how I could possible show her how much our marriage means to me and how much I know it is worth saving (even though I am not allowed to tell her any of this). I started writing “love letters to her that I will never send” with the intention of using this to help with my want to reach out to her. After they are written I re-read them and then burn them so that they cannot be sent nor can I be tempted to send them. This helps but I finally decided to come here and see what other aid I might be able to get.

[soldier]

I have read several archived posts from a WAW who use to be very active in these forums with the tag of smartcookie and her story has touched me deeply and allowed me to really take a deep look into my own faults. I was inspired by one of her posts and so I decided I would make my own story written in the same powerful light as the post she had written. I hope this story helps to show some of the LBS's perspective just the same way that cookie's post showed the depth of the WAW's perspective.

There once was a boy who grew up thinking he had learned the difference between right and wrong. His family seemed strong and together and the boy was generally happy. As the boy grew older he started to realize that his thoughts where not completely correct. His parents fought quite a bit and there was often yelling and cursing throughout the house. The boy did not know it but he was starting to develop his idea of how conflict is managed. The boy’s mother saw much of his father in him and as the mother and father started to grow farther apart the mother began to direct her anger to the next best source. The boy hated when his mother would yell and curse at him. It made him feel very sad and confused.

The boy grew into a young adult and started to foster relationships of his own but each one seemed to be strained as if there was some unforeseen pressure weighing on each and every one he attempted to make weather it was a friendship or a youthful love interest. It felt like this constant strain was causing each relationship to be destined for failure. The young adult was hurt many times and as a result he stood helpless as his confidence within himself slowly eroded to the point where he truly felt no more than a shell.

At last the young adult became a man and with what seemed at the time as a lack of options he ran off to the military. There is no room for unsure or unconfident people in that environment. The man realized that if he was to survive his experience then he would have to mold his shell so that he could hide the fact that it was still very empty and mold he did. With every ounce of his being he attempted to extrude a confidence that in truth was non-existent. So hard did he work to mold this shell that he even was able to convince himself of how real it was but no matter how much he lied to himself the truth was that there was no foundation for this new fake front.

The man met a beautiful woman who from the first moment he saw her she brought color and light into his life. The man desired nothing more than to have her by his side for the rest of his life. The couple developed a relationship and over time they got married. She traveled with him throughout his 7 years within the military and helped to support him through his darkest hours. When he was afraid she offered courage. When he was sore and tired she offered a comfortable place to rest. When it was so tough that the man didn't know how he would ever go on then she offered him support to get him through. When he was in doubt she gave her own confidence freely to him to make him feel at ease. When he was stressed she gave herself completely to him to help relieve his burdens.

The man had never known such unconditional love and devotion and he was so happy. As time went by the couple grew old well beyond their years and the saw many hardships such as separation and loss. With the constant moving around, the woman never had an opportunity to make many friends or see her family. The couple had each other and only each other and this made the man very happy as he enjoyed all of the many things that the woman gave so freely but this caused the man to become lazy within their relationship. He remembered what he learned from a young age from his father and followed suit. He failed to put the time and effort into giving the woman what she needed in return. The man felt that her bank was limitless and everything was fine and as always there was still this strain or pressure that seemed to weight the relationship down.

Then came the day that the man left the military behind. It was for no other reason than he was now going to be a father and the constant movement was no longer appealing. For the first time in so many years the couple found themselves close to family again and old friends. The woman was very excited because she had been somewhat neglected in the relationship and she now saw an outlet to receive some of the things she had been missing. She immediately started reconnecting with all of these other people but this made the man insanely angry. He though how dare she offer her bank of love to others. For years this was for me and me alone. In his anger he began to yell and say things that were not appropriate. This came natural to him because he grew up with it for so long. He lost himself and the fake shell that he had molded so long ago had fallen to reveal that true empty man underneath.

The yelling scared the woman and hurt her but she hoped desperately that it was just a transition and in time it would pass. To appease him temporarily she distanced herself from friends and family hoping that when the time was right and the man was calm she could reconnect again. He just needed time she thought but the anger would not subside and years past. Every time the woman so much as hinted about seeking a connection for love the man ridiculed her and tried to keep his grip on her tighter and tighter. The woman could not breathe. She was suffocating in the home that had made. It was no longer a home but a prison. She tried to busy herself with house work and her daughter because theses where the only things that she would not get punished for. She so desperately wanted to escape the pain that she was forced to endure for so many years but what about her daughter she thought.

The man felt uncomfortable having left the military and now having such freedom and he felt like he needed his wife closer to him than ever before. He needed her as a crutch while he nursed himself back into a normal life. He made it through college and became very successful over those years. The woman, never wavering even in her depression, gave him courage to finish and become something of worth. This was no surprise as she always had but even with all of his new found success he felt constantly out of sorts because as he learned to adapt to being out of the military he also started to realize that his fake shell of confidence was gone. With this safety net gone he had to use his wife for everything now. He was on autopilot and his mind was fogged over. To him everything was status quo.

Finally the day came when the man received a call from work and it was his wife. She confessed that she was terrible unhappy and that she wanted space and time to think about things. He asked if they could talk about it and she said she had already gotten their daughter and was gone. In that instant the man felt his entire world crush in on him. It was as if all of the pain that had been dealt out over their 11 year marriage had been transferred to him in that very moment. He was paralyzed with fear. The fog dissipated and he could see the reality of his situation as if he was holding the hand of a very sick relative on their death bed. There was no work or sleep or hunger. Only pain and confusion remained. How could he see so clearly now the error of his ways but be helpless to do anything about it.

The man instantly committed to changing himself at the core of the problem and he wanted to desperately show his wife that he could be the man that she deserved but his wife was disgusted by the mere sight of him. She would not talk to him or let him touch her and the few times that did have need to be in the same house she wouldn't even stay in the same room as him. She didn't want this now not after she had waited for so long. Not after she had begged and pleaded for him see wake up and open his eyes to her reality and her needs. Not after she had prayed so hard that she started to question her very faith as how could God allow her to be put through this constant misery. Her soul was empty and she had no more left to give.

The more he read and learned the more the man grew and developed. He started to see just what he had done to his loving wife all of these years. He was mortified and ashamed. As time passed the man realized that there was nothing that he could ever do or say to his wife to take back what he had done to her or give back all he had taken from her. He wanted that energy that she gave so much that he had become a void. This void devoured her energy but did nothing with it. He didn't turn it back into something positive or share his own energy with her. Instead he took and took and took until his wife was completely dry. All of the color and light she had brought to his life he selfishly kept to himself and himself alone and instead of trying to give some of his own color and light to the dark cold dungeon that her world had become he tried to keep her from any and all potential source that might have offered even a glimpse of hope to her because he wanted all of her light, color and energy to himself. Weather he realized what he was doing or not and weather he meant to or not, he had slowly destroyed her and now he would pay the greatest debt he would ever have to pay.

[Nettles]

Hang in there Soldier. Make the changes, fill a new shell by knowing what makes you happy. But fill it for you, not her.

"No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path." - Buddha

[soldier]

Well we are drifting into the three week territory of having space from each other and it seems to me that my W gets more and more aggressive with me as the days go by. In the first week or so of our space, she put up a very cold front as if this was not bothering her at all. I have read that this is normal and so I knew to expect it. Recently, however, her demeanor has changed. It still isn't positive at all but not as nonchalant as before. She tells me that this is hard on her and that my D5 always wants to come back home and stay with daddy which makes me happy inside as my D5 is a large part of my world yet sad for my W at the same time. My W is a very good mother and her and our D5 have always been very close. I think my D5’s reaction to our current situation has been very frustrating for my W. My D5 seems to be blaming mommy for all the troubles and that really isn't true.

On the GAL front I was able to get in touch with an old war buddy and it looks like I will be making a trip out of state to visit him and his family sometime early May. I also picked up some new self-help books to read on that I found by digging through these forums. For those interested they are as follows:

Good husband Great Marriage: Finding the Good Husband in the Man You Married
The 5 Love Language Men’s Edition: The Secret to Love that Lasts
The 5 Languages of Apology: How to Experience Healing in All Your Relationships
Controlling People: How to Recognize, Understand, and Deal With People Who Try to Control You
The Emotionally Abusive Relationship: How to Stop Being Abused and How to Stop Abusing

I will give a better review of these books and my thoughts as I have time to read them. They should come in some time today and I am looking forward to diving in to them.

[soldier]

Thank you Nettles for the words of encouragement. You are right and I truly am trying as hard as possible to make these changes about me. Early on they where not. I was only concerned for how to get my W back as quick as possible. As time goes on I am settling into the realization of my current situation and having ready many other stories now at how this can and often does play out I am starting to set more realistic expectations on things. All of the sudden these changes start to move more towards things that I know I need to take care of regardless of how my R with my W plays out in the future. It is slow but I am starting to get it.

[Nettles]

That's great Soldier. Keep it up.

And do post about those books. I'm interested to hear if they are worth reading.

[soldier]

Well I only have a few new things to report currently and they are mostly all good things. Still no contact with the spouse save for a very business oriented conversation on the phone in which she let me know that she did not want me to attend our traditional Easter function at her dad’s today. That was disheartening to say the least but expected.

GAL report, I did introduce myself to my neighbor for the first time in two years as he was sitting in his back yard around a fire pit just relaxing and we had a very good conversation. It turns out that in his retirement he runs a non-profit organization that teaches people with disabilities how to sail boats. He told me that they are always looking for volunteers to help out and that I was more than welcome to go with him on a Saturday to see if I was interested. He even said I could bring my D5 along so that made me happy. I also spoke with my brother and he asked if I had ever thought about riding motorcycles for which he is already and avid rider for many years. He said he had plenty of bikes in his collection and I was welcome to give it a try any time I was interested.

As far as the books, the first one I received in the mail was the “Good husband Great Marriage: Finding the Good Husband in the Man You Married” and I am already about half way through it and it is in my opinion a phenomenal read. It is written by a guy and for guys and in a language that I found very easy to understand. It does not feel like a college text book and in many ways reminds me of DR as far as its layout and style. The content is excellent and has already given me many great ideas of how to treat my wife should the opportunity ever present itself. The chapters are small which makes it easy to pick up for a short time and put back down when you are busy. I would highly recommend this one to any husband and there is many things in there for the wives as well. All around I would give it 4 ½ stars out of 5 for sure at a minimum.

I watched the movie “The Great Gatsby” with Leonardo Dicaprio. I had never ready the original book but found the movie to be stunning. I did regret watching it some as it bring some tears to my eyes given my current situation but still it was a great movie and I would also highly recommend it when a decent level of emotional detachment has been achieved.

[Nettles]

Thanks for the info on the book. I'm going to see if my library has it and check it out.

Good work on the GAL. The volunteering thing sounds awesome. Helping others is going to make you feel really good about you. And to have the ability to do it with your D and teach her about helping others? What an added bonus! I've been trying to find a similar scenario for me and my kids but haven't spent as much time on it as I need to.

[soldier]

So yesterday I received a call from my daughter for a quick goodnight and after we had said goodnight she gave my wife the phone and it was the first time we had spoken in a few days. I lightly attempted to make small talk asking how her week had ended and how the weekend had gone. I asked about how the Easter family function went but the whole time she was cold and distant. She just seemed to be very impatient and wanting to get off the phone. As a result we only had about a 5 minute conversation and I told her I would not keep her and longer and excused myself.

I had been busy reading on my books and unfortunately other than the DR book most of them are geared towards marriages in trouble but still of a working nature. My situation, the same as many on these forums, is that my wife seemingly cannot stand me at all now. After reading on these other books (ones that are not DR) it got me feeling good about my changes and made me very positive. The problem is it also pushed expectation into my mind. I need to keep this in better check.

It hurts me deeply to see her make this look so easy for her when in truth it is a constant sting to me as I can’t get all of the good memories of our 11 years together out of mind. Was I really such a monster that she now has no emotions what so ever for me? When my D5 was born my wife had some heart complications and as a result had to remain in the hospital for 7 days. I never left her room and I was more afraid than ever in my life to include my military time and being aggressed by enemy forces. I couldn't lose her and I had to be by her. Now she doesn't even want to see my face and I just don’t understand why she is behaving as if all that time and all those events mean nothing to her and never did. I know it isn't my place to understand so I am working hard to force these thought from my mind and stick with what I can control but the pain is still there.

I guess I will just keep reading and learning and hoping. On a brighter note, I will have my D5 for this next weekend so I am very excited about that.

[Nettles]

Don't assume it is easy for her. I thought it was easy for my WAS, until I saw her. She lost 10% of her body weight very quickly, and is still struggling with her decision.

It may be she doesn't want to see you because it is a reminder that the decision hurt someone deeply and/or you remind her of the good times you had. There is no way to know.

I understand the hurt and pain. I understand the wanting to understand. But from the sounds of your conversation with her, I think your W needs space. I know it's hard, but don't initiate conversation with her. Let her do the talking. Anything from you right now is pressure. Reduce the pressure and see what happens.

[soldier]

You are right Nettles and thank you again for the perspective. I need to stop with the mind reading game. Yesterday was the first 100 percent no contact day between me and my wife (email, text or phone) and it was actually easier on me in the end as I didn’t have the negative feeling that always lingers after one of her cold communication. I am going to strive to keep this no contact up through this week unless something comes up in regards to my daughter.

On brighter thoughts I have lost over 20 pounds myself now and have been able to get the house in really good shape. I just ordered some parts for a hot tub that came with our house that has been broken for about a year and I thought I would get it up and running again. It will be another nice distraction for me and once it is fixed it will help in the whole “take care of you” concept. I picked up everything I need for an Easter basket for my daughter as well as the stuff to color some Easter eggs with her and I’m really looking forward to having her this weekend.

I am about ¾ of the way through the last book I gave a review on and hope to have ti finished before the weekend. I don’t know which one I will pick up next but when I decide I will give another review as time permits.

[Nettles]

I've lost about 20 pounds too. BD might be the most effective weight loss program ever, but of course, it is also the most painful.

I catch myself mind reading. It is hard to stop. Patience.

[soldier]

Nettles, I saw in your thread that you spoke of Buddhist thoughts which got my curious so I started looking up some of the ideas and concepts behind it. It is definitely and interesting way of living life and I like that it is really a life choice as opposed to a specific religion so it can be done alongside my given religious beliefs and in many ways goes hand and hand with them. I have really enjoyed the 4 noble truths. Nice comment about the weight loss. Maybe we can market some kind of business plan on it. The new and improved weight loss program BD 5000. You are guaranteed to lose weight quickly, if you don’t get crushed first from a broken heart, or your money back.

I have been working hard on controlling my temper and anger as this I know was one of the factors that lead me to where I currently am. I find myself trying to put myself in situations that I know in the past get my blood flowing so that I can force myself to stay calm and not yell or curse of even get excited. This will sounds funny but I now have a much better relationship with my two dogs as I am starting to learn to let small things roll off my back and net get so worked up over them. I also seem to have a stronger relationship with my D5 which is worth more than anything in the world to me right now.

I am about 40 pages out from being done with my current book and will be do the one titled “The Emotionally Abusive Relationship: How to Stop Being Abused and How to Stop Abusing” next. As always I will let you know how it work for me.

I get to pick my D5 up today after work and will have her through the rest of this week and weekend. I am very excited and have many things planned for us. I couldn't believe I actually got her for the Easter weekend. I think I will take her to the park for 30 or 40 minutes after I pick her up tonight just to get things started right.

[Nettles]

That is funny that you wrote about a business opportunity with the weight loss because my original post had a reference to making money off of the idea and I deleted it.

Like you, I have issues with my anger. I have found that the quotes of the Buddha and the writings of the Dalai Lama have helped me with that. The book "How to Practice: The Way to a Meaningful Life" is very powerful. In fact, I'm only on Chapter 2 because the first practice has been so influential in my attitude and outlook. I highly recommend you look for it at your local library or go to a bookstore and just read Chapter 2. If it has any impact, consider purchasing it. I really like the books because the focus is on the self. I don't believe it conflicts with any of my religious beliefs. To me, it is more about a life philosophy.

And it doesn't sound funny about your dogs. They totally pick up on negative and positive energy, and that is a sign that your vibes are changing.

That's great that you have a better relationship with you D. I know that before BD, I took time with my kids for granted. In fact, I had the attitude that they were inconveniencing me at times. Now, I cherish every minute with them.

Easter will be fun with your D too. It isn't my weekend with the kids, but W has agreed that I'll fill up the plastic eggs (my usual job), hide them, and watch the egg hunt Sunday morning.

I think we might be starting a list of positives out of our BD. In no particular order:

1) Weight loss
2) Improved relationship(s) with our child(ren)

Let's keep it going. Here is one to consider (applies to me at least)

3) Finding things that make ME happy.

I lost what made me happy, and W had no problems with finding her own happiness. I resented her for it. Instead of finding mine, I tried to keep her from hers.

[soldier]

Once again your words strike true Nettles. I too felt like I lost what had made me my own person and I also had much resentment towards my W for moving on without me. I am glad that your W is letting you participate in the Easter activities as that is very important for sure. It is weird how many things I was able to take for granted prior to this space that I am dealing with. I walk around the house and it is so empty and quiet and you can’t help but think and realize. It has been the single most changing experience in my life even beating out 7 years in the military. I will definitely check your book recommendation out as I have very much enjoyed what I have read thus far on the topic of the Buddhist way of life. It seems so calming and positive.

So as far as my situation goes but W sent me an email yesterday saying:

W - “It seems that you have been extremely short with me as of our last phone conversation. I know you said you would give me some space, so I suppose that is what you are doing.”

She talked about business with my daughter for this up and coming weekend and then ended her initial letter with:

W - “Can we do lunch sometime next week? Let me know when you have some time. I hope things are okay.”

This made me happy but I immediately began dropping my expectations so as to not get overly excited or enthusiastic. The conversation continued for a few emails and here are the main highlights:

Me - “I did not mean for me to come off as being short with you. I am trying to respect and honor your wishes”
Me - “It would be nice to do a lunch together next week sometime. Just let me know when and where and I will figure it out.”
Me - “Things are just fine. I am learning more than I ever thought possible about myself and my actions and recently I have been doing a lot of thinking as well. I would love to share some with you sometime but I don't think that now is that time.”
W - “Thank you for the answer and reply. Perhaps lunch next week would be a better time to discuss things.”
Me - “I will follow you lead and go at your pace.”

It might not have been a picture perfect conversation as I borderlined on bring R into it but I wanted to also try to build some mystery with her. All in all I would give it a C+ and I will try better next time. There is no date set for lunch but I am going to work hard this weekend to get my mind right for when it happens. I am much more emotional detached then I was but a bit more polish is probably wise.

Here is another item for our list of positives:

4) Gaining a deeper understanding of who I am.

[Nettles]

I'm no expert soldier, but I think you did fine with your conversation. My only comment would have been to leave this out: "I would love to share some with you sometime". So now when you have lunch, don't bring that up, let her. If she's interested, she will, and if not, that's okay too. Your dogs have picked up on your changes and she will too, even if you don't verbalize it. And it is actions that speak much louder than words and actions are what she'll believe.

I do find her opening statements interesting. I'm not sure she likes that from you and may try to draw you into something. I think you should stay with the 'giving you space' and 'not pressuring you'.

I know it is hard to manage those expectations, but lunch will not be the resolution of things, but it is a good step forward. Do you keep a log of small accomplishments on the road to your goal? This is certainly one that'll be on that list.

And I like #4. Given your lunch update and some things going on with me, i'll submit:

5) Learning patience.

[soldier]

As of now I have not been keeping a journal or log of any sort as I have been reading so much that this has taken up most of my free time. I think, however, I will find the time and start as it sounds like another good outlet for the emotions and what not. Besides if I have time to post here then surly I can take a few minutes to write out what is working and what is not.

Yesterday was rough for no apparent reason as many small things throughout the day reminded me of the W and by that evening I was feeling tired of fighting the feelings. I picked up my D5 after school and we were able to play some last night before bed which helped to take my mind off of things for a while. This morning I am feeling better and started the morning off military style with some physical training. I am hoping I can keep the thoughts at bay better today and looking forward to some quality time with my D5.

[Nettles]

I think one can't fight feelings and emotions. They are natural, part of what makes us human, and are going to happen. One must control and analyze how they react to feelings and emotions.

[Nettles]

Happy Easter soldier. I hope you are having a great weekend with your D.

[soldier]

Thank you Nettles, I already went to your thread and see that you had a very good weekend with your kids and W. I am happy for you. My weekend was busy and fairly good. My W had gone to West Virginia with her mother and me and D5 got to do all sorts of stuff. We went to 2 different parks and painted eggs and my sister came over with her D and the girls got to play and have a sleep over. We got to go to a special Easter festival that my sister’s place of work sponsored and they had face painting and pony rides and a petting zoo and all sort of stuff. Saturday I and my sister made baskets for the girls and Sunday morning the both had a great search and find. I ended it with a family dinner Sunday and a special Easter egg hunt that was just me and D5 and the eggs we had painted earlier.

Daughter wise it was a great time but doing all of the family events did make me miss my wife greatly. I did several hours of exercise throughout the weekend to help take my mind off of things and I also did a bit of meditation for the first time ever. It helped but Sunday night when my wife made her normal call to say goodnight to D5 I picked up the phone and it felt really good to hear W voice so I attempted some small talk because I was missing her so much. I was missing my friend. The conversation became awkward and I accidentally drifted into R talk for just a sentence or two and she became quickly annoyed and very short. I realized the mistake I was making and ended the conversation immediately but the damage was done.

I know that I am not supposed to let me heart take control but it always seems to get the best of me and it is really messing things up for me on this one. W called back later for D5 and I saw that D5 had a small fever in between calls so after the conversation between W and D5 I took the phone again and I told her I was sorry for letting the old me creep back up and that I just want to do what it takes to get us all in a better place regardless of what that meant. She thanked me for the apology and we did have a short ten minute conversation that was much better than the first one. I excused myself from the phone at that point and she asked if I still wanted to do lunch sometime this week. I said that would be nice and right before she hung up the phone she said something that was probably a slip of the tongue but it felt good none the less. She said “I will talk to you soon baby” which is how she always used to talk to me.

Again I know it was probably nothing but I am going to use it as fuel to continue the fight. I know that my first call was counterproductive and I need to continue to emotionally detach more but other than that brief 10 minutes bad conversation I did very well as far as the last 5 days are concerned and am looking forward to our lunch some time this week. For safety I have also started to get my mind right in the event that W chooses to not invite me after all and will take it on the chin and not let it get to me.

So as promised here is the next book review that I have for “The Emotionally Abusive Relationship: How to Stop Being Abused and How to Stop Abusing”. I am half ways through this book now and I enjoy this one very much. Although the title might imply that it is more geared towards the person being abused that is not completely true. It is written for both abused and abuser. There is much insight within this book as to how to help you find the root of why an abuser might be behaving in this manner and it has inspired me to dig into my past a bit and see why I have been behaving the way that I have. All and All I would give it 3.75 / 5 only because half of the book is written for the person being abuse and although this is helpful insight it is not as helpful IMO as the chapters geared towards the abusers as this is the category that I fell under. I think it would be a good candidate for a library read.

Moving forward from my little mess up I am going to take this week to really concentrate deeper on emotional detachment. I know that this is an ongoing process but I think it needs some special upfront attention currently and then I can maintain and build from there. If anyone has any good sources of info on the subject that they would like to share, this would be great.

[Nettles]

This link is referenced several times in threads I have read regarding detachment: http://www.livestrong.com/article/14712-developing-detachment/

It sounds like this weekend was fantastic. Don't worry about the initial conversation with W. It didn't cause permanent damage. You recognized the behavior and changed it on the fly. This is as important as totally eliminating the behavior.

[soldier]

Thank you for the link Nettles. I will check it out right after I post this post.

Well today is the day for me and my wife to have a lunch together. She invited me and I accepted. This will be the first time we have seen each other in almost a month. I have a nice haircut and good cologne on and I have a new outfit that fits me nicely (having now lost over 30 lbs.) I have no expectations at all and I am just going to concentrate on having a nice lunch and focusing on her instead of me. I will listen intently and always look her in the eyes with kindness as opposed to a weird and awkward stare. I will not bring up anything to do with R, my changes, or us in general for that matter. I will stay calm and collected and confident. I will remain positive and happy. If asked questions I will keep my responses polite but also short and mysterious. When the lunch is over I try to end it first and will thank her for the visit and wish her well for the rest of her day. I will get in my truck and then as soon as I am out of her sight completely break down into a ball of putty (j/k). I think I am ready and hope I don’t make a mistake. I have worked really hard this week to emotionally detach and it seems to be working well.

On a side note, my W and I work in the same profession. I have been doing it a bit longer and have a bit more experience and contacts within my professional network. Often I get contacted by recruiters wanting to throw job offers at me and my W is currently actively looking for a better paying job. A few days back I was contacted by one such recruiter and I was not interested in the job but thought of my wife and introduced this recruiter to her. They started working together and my wife had a potential phone interview today. She was nervous as we work in IT and this was a tech screening so I offered to do prep with her last night. She called me and we walked through tech screening questions for over an hour.

My thought was I might be doing too much for her by wanting to help her out professionally. I am open to any guidance someone might be able to give me on weather my behavior is appropriate or not. I am not buying gifts or doing work around her current house for her. This was strictly professional but I still want to make sure.

I will post later tonight on how it went and how good, or bad, I did.

[Nettles]

Sending good vibes your way for the lunch soldier. Based on what you wrote, you are in a great mental state for it.

Others will probably think differently, but I see no issue with helping someone professionally like that. It doesn't look like pursuing. I am curious if you think W was surprised that you gave the recruiter W name. Would W think you (the old you) were too bitter/hurt/whatever to do something like that? And if she saw all of this as pursuing and felt pressured by it, she would not have called you for help.

[soldier]

Hey Nettles, to answer your question helping my wife with her professional career I have done for many years so this behavior is one of the good “old me” things that I have brought into me new me attitude. I do agree that if she thought this was pressure of any kind she would not have hesitated to say no to my help so in the end I feel good about my decision.

So lunch I think went really well. She still had some cold comments to through my way every so often but I never broke my cool once and simply validated her feelings and moved right on into the conversation. I asked questions to her about what she had been doing recently to keep the conversation going and I looked her right in the eyes the whole time. She did not look into mine much but when she did I could tell she was not use to such undivided attention. I listened intently to every single word she said and it was actually quite a great experience. I hadn’t realized how much I had failed to do that in years past.

She asked me about if I had seen anyone as far as therapy and I told her I had seen one therapist but didn't think she was a good fit for me and I was in the process of looking for a new one. I asked her if she had seen anyone and she said no. Only because we had been on the subject I made a small mistake and I asked about marriage consoling and her interest in it and she said she wanted that for years but I always said no and so now she wasn't interested. I immediately let it go and stopped pushing.

She asked why I had taken a few days off of work recently (D5 had told my W this info) and I just told her I had some stuff to take care of and left it there. She said she hoped everything was alright and I told her that I was just fine. I could tell that she had noticed my weight loss and she even told me that I looked nice which was the first compliment I had received from her in probably over a month.

We caught up and laughed a good bit and it was a very nice visit. As it approached time to end the lunch I exited first and we went to our vehicles which were parked next to each other’s and she started yet another conversation. After she finished with her little bonus round I told her that this was nice and I really enjoyed seeing her again. I asked her if she would mind if I gave her a hug and she said she actually had wanted that very much. We had a good hug which felt better than anything I have every felt in my entire life. We released and she started to talk again but I dismissed myself saying unfortunately I had to get back to work. I said good bye and hoped in my truck.

All and all I am feeling really good right now and it was enough to recharge my batteries for the fight ahead. I am setting no expectations at all but trying to enjoy the many small victories that were within this simple lunch.

An interesting side note is that with the distance from her mothers house to where she currently works she already faces a commute that is over and hour and some change long and it is wearing on her from what I can tell. From our home to her current job is more like 10 minutes if that. The job that she is applying for would be an additional 26 miles further which would be close to 1 hour and 35 minutes from her mothers and about 25 minutes from our home. When it came up in conversation she said she was excited about this job but didn't like the idea of commuting from our home to the jobs location. This is interesting because she didn't say her mothers house but instead specifically said from our home to this new job. Again no expectations but the idea did make me happy.

[Nettles]

You rocked it! Get your log out and write down all the small victories. You need to find an IC. It is important to her, and, most importantly, it'll help you. Just talking with someone about what you are going through and what improvements you are making helps a lot.

Now keep doing what you are doing and observe how she responds to this.

[soldier]

Thank you Nettles for all the encouragement. I am feeling better than I have in a month of Sundays and my working out is getting easier and easier and I am actually starting to look forward to each new day as opposed to in the past where I always seemed to dread them.

I have one very positive addition to the already awesome lunch that me and W had. Later that day I picked my D5 up for a birthday party that my niece was having. That night my wife called to get some more professional help and I stayed very calm and completely removed any expectation from the earlier lunch from the equation. I helped her with everything she needed and then gave some admin notes about D5 about our next kid swap. I knew she had another big interview coming up for her pending new job that I have been helping her with and so I ended the conversation with some strong encouragement that was 100 percent focused on her and had nothing to do about me or R at all. I kept this short but powerful and then wished her a good night and right before she hung up the phone she said “I love you baby” to me and I actually paused for a second as it had been so long since my W had said those words to me. I recovered quick so as not to make it weird and said I love you too and good night and then I hung up the phone.

I know this could have been just a slip up but that is still ok as my time in the military taught me that slip ups only happen when defenses are becoming loosened and people are getting lax. People only get lax when they feel safe and secure about the area that they are at. As always I am going to keep this internally for me as motivation and flush all expectations from my system. It still feels like the lines of communication are starting to open up between us which is making very happy.

I did see an IC for two sessions but I was unable to connect with that particular therapist. I am going to try to find one that specializes in the particular personality disorder that I seem to exhibit several signs of as I feel pretty strongly that I may have this disorder. It is borderline personality disorder and it is a very common disorder among emotionally abusive people. The last book I read “The Emotionally Abusive Relationship: How to Stop Being Abused and How to Stop Abusing” talked about it in-depth and I learned quite a bit about it. Suffice it to say I meet almost all of the criteria of this disorder and I think this is part of what I need to take care of if I ever want to have a new relationship with my spouse.

I have moved on to another one of my books and this one is called “The 5 Languages of Apology: How to Experience Healing in All Your Relationships” and as always after I actually get some ways into it I will give a book review but it is written in part by the same author of “The 5 Love Language Men’s Edition” that I have on deck. I have heard good things about this book and it is all about being able to give true applies that will actually reach people on a subconscious level in order to allow for real reconciliation. This may be a bit early for me in my current situation but I still think it is important information.

[SemperFi00]

Soldier, just caught up on your situation.

Sounds like you have really picked up the philosophy of DB’ing – quicker than a lot of folks, especially me. Also appreciate the book references......

Seems like there may be some small, positive signs in your recent interactions with W which I am sure is very exciting you. Glad to hear those updates……

I know that you know that this is a long process and that you have identified and are working on things to improve yourself which will be good regardless of where things end up with W.

Remember the analogy of feeding a squirrel……

Glad to hear you continue to make progress on opportunities that you have identified for yourself. Wising you the best.

Stay strong!

[soldier]

Thank you SemperFi00 for the kind words. Last Thursday was nice but I kept my expectations as low as possible and am glad I did because I did not hear from my wife all weekend at all save for me having to call her to explain that my breaks where shot on my truck and they wanted to install a new cylinder kit to the tune of 1000 dollars’ worth of work. This was a bummer for sure but we had the money in the bank. I just wanted to tell her about it as it was a large amount. She then got mad at me as if I did this on purpose to spit her. She still has all sorts of hatred towards me and I shouldn't have said anything at all but I told her “I just can’t win can I” and then promptly excused myself from the phone conversation.

I will keep fighting the good fight for as long as I can take it and I have a good bit further to go for my own personal change as the above comment proved but she just gets so mean at me. It is funny but her constant coldness and anger is actually what is making it easy to emotionally detach as I find myself wanting to talk to her less and less. Every time I start to feel good about myself and the changes I am making, I am forced to speak with her for business or our D5 and she makes me feel horrible. I guess she feels justified because of what I did in the past but I was brought up that two wrongs do not make a right.

[soldier]

It had been a little while since I posted last and thought I would write some of this out as this is really my journal of sorts. I finished the book “The Emotionally Abusive Relationship: How to Stop Being Abused and How to Stop Abusing” and found it very helpful. I may have stated this already but the book talks about a specific disorder that I seem to meet much of the criteria for known as borderline personality disorder (BPD). I have started IC back up and have my next session this Friday. I plan on digging into this BPD and seeing if I truly have this or not. I am somewhat excited about maybe figuring out some of why I behave the way I do and hope that it helps me fix some of the core issues of why I do poorly in relationships in general.

So as I explained in a previous post, I recently incurred a 1000 dollar repair bill on my truck for which I had to call my wife to discuss finances prior to undergoing the repair. My wife got very mad at me and spit quite a bit of venom at me over the whole situation. I decided that I was not giving her enough space and I was tired of her always hurting me while I am trying to be as pleasant as possible. One minute I am helping her get a better paying job and the next I am treated like a child and spat on.

She sent me an email Monday apologizing for her anger and wanting to know if the truck got fixed. She also asked if I wanted her to come over one night this week to go over bills and what not and then ended her message by telling me they had put her in for a large raise in pay at her work. I did not reply as it felt like another way for her to get me back on the hook so as to be hurtful to me again. She sent another email yesterday with some admin stuff and again asking if I wanted her to come over to the house either last night or tonight to go over some additional bill related stuff (all none pressing matters). I replied that “I would rather not have you over tonight or tomorrow” and that “Maybe we can attempt it sometime next month when I have D5 so that it will be more easy”. I added a few small sentences about “the truck was fixed” and when I was picking D5 up next and just to keep it polite I told her I was “happy to hear about her potential raise in pay”

I am kind of shooting from the hip as I feel I am in the LRT but am not sure if I am doing properly or not. I don’t have many senior DB’ers on my thread so I guess I will just have to keep doing my best and taking care of myself.

I also finished a book called “The 5 Languages of Apology: How to Experience Healing in All Your Relationships” which is authored in part by the same guy who does the 5 love languages series. This book was not as solid as I had hoped. I found about 6 chapters very useful and the rest I could take it or leave it. I still found good information within the book mind you but overall it was a bit more lack luster than I had expected. I enjoyed each of the 5 chapters dedicated towards the 5 languages of apology and there where one or two others about how to tie it together that where nice as well. This book is definitely a “library read and take a few notes” type of book and I would give it 2.5 / 5 personally.

I am now reading the book “The 5 Love Language Men’s Edition: The Secret to Love that Lasts” for which I have much higher hopes for and will post a review after I get a bit farther through it. I am two chapters in and already find it a much more valuable read then the previous book.

[Nettles]

Hang in there soldier. It is great that you are going to an IC. BPD or not, it sounds like it would help to talk to someone about relationships.

I'm sorry W is being hurtful. That really [censored]. Try to remember that you can't control W but you can control your response to her. Don't let it stop you from being the best soldier you can be.

It has been a while since we added a positive to our list. Can you come up with a #6?

[soldier]

Hey Nettles,

Thank you as always for the kind words. They help quite a bit. Well I had another IC session today and was sharing with my IC some of the things I had been reading about and she actually told me that she would find it very hard to believe that I have BPD. That made me feel good to hear and we talked about maybe going through some of the criteria next session to explore the possibility but given what she had seen and heard it was fairly unlikely in her opinion.

I am still walking through the modules of the DBT program. There is quite a bit of free materials for it online and I highly recommend it to anyone who wants better control over themselves. It is very founded in the Buddhist principals and I find it very enjoyable and relaxing to practice. There are 4 modules total and each module has a number of skills to practice. For those interested here are two of the best sites I have found for additional information, videos and the like:

http://www.dbtselfhelp.com/index.html
http://ilovedbt.com/

As far as the W and my sitch, not a whole lot is new but we did have our first email chain in about a week or so as my wife was able to get an offer on that job I was helping with and it looks like the salary is going to be quite a significant pay increase. She sent me a text message which prompted me to send a quick email. I will not go into great detail but the conversation highlights are as follows:

Me: I am not looking for any kind of response but I just wanted to tell you that I am really happy about your potential raise more so than I wrote in my last email to you. You really deserve it and I am glad that they (the people at your work) may actually see that for a change. xxK is huge and it made me really feel happy inside.

Me: The only other thing I have is this: Please don't give up on me quite yet. I am getting there and I will not stop until I get there and for once I can truly say that I am looking forward to the future. I still have a few more dues to pay but the good news is it looks like you are paid in full

W: Did you happen to get my text this morning? Thank you for the email, and I don’t mind you reaching out. Believe it or not, I miss you too and although I’m still working through things on my end, I haven’t given up. You may write as you would like and perhaps lunch sometime next week, if you feel up to it, would be nice.

W: I know I don’t have to write back, but I wanted to as well. Thank you for the help and feedback, and I hope things are going well for you.

Me: Lunch next week would be great if you have the time. I would really enjoy seeing you.

Me: I have many things I want to tell you but I just don't know when the right time is. I have many things to truly apologize and repent for but I just don't want to push you farther away. The books I read help a lot to show me the error of my ways and help me fix the core issues I have found I possess but there is nothing in there about when you can reach out to your spouse without pushing her away in the process. I am guessing this is still too early so I will not get into now as I want it to be in person when it happens anyway but I still feel that a true apology is well over due from me to you as well as from me to your Mother and Jerry and your Aunt Dee.

W: Thank you for your words and I appreciate the growth. I hope you have a good weekend.

As usual it was not my best but not horrible and once again my wife seemed to be somewhat happy with me. It was good to hear her say she actually missed me and it is nice to have another lunch on the horizon. Small steps right

So I consolidated our list in its current form and for number 6 I would add:

1) Weight loss
2) Improved relationship(s) with our child(ren)
3) Finding things that make ME happy.
4) Gaining a deeper understanding of who I am.
5) Learning patience.
6) Discovering how to enjoy the small things

[soldier]

Well it has been a while since I posted last and I thought I would throw something out here. I started my Master’s Degree college class for this month and that has acted as a good time filler. My trip to North Carolina is a go for this weekend so that is nice. I have a small 5k fun run coming up at the end of this month with some friends from work and later this week I will be attending a local chapter meeting of The Professional Association of SQL Server (PASS) to better myself in my career. I set up a doctor’s appointment for some yearly stuff just to make sure my body is still in good shape and I have now lost 42 pounds with only around 40 or 50 more to go until my goal. I bought some new cloths and a pair of good running shoes and did my first run in over 6 years the other day. It was only a 1 miler but you have to start somewhere.

There has been no contact with my wife other than D5 or business related since my last post and she has still not reached out to me to see about lunch sometime this week as she said she wanted to. I am being patient but it still hurts. She has yet to reach out to me via any type of communication of her own free will save for one email and a few small text messages. I guess this is how it goes but I really miss my friend something bad. I don’t get posts from senior DB’ers but if I did I would imagine they would tell me that this is when it is most important for me to maintain my patience but this doesn’t make you miss your best friend any less.

I bought her a mother’s day card any filled it out inside but I will not give it to her as I know this is not what I should do. Ohh what a wonderful game this is. When the military sent me to Korea, all my family was sad to loose me for a year but I could never explain to them that I lost all of them at once for that year. The pain was hard on me but I had to stay strong to encourage them. Funny thing is I would gladly do three tours (3 years) back to back if I could just talk to my friend again and have her enjoy talking to me in the process.

I finished the book “The 5 Love Language Men’s Edition: The Secret to Love that Lasts” and found it to be a really solid book. I enjoyed it much greater than the apology one that I read prior. This one goes over the love side of things and has good examples of how to feed someone’s love tank by speaking to them in their primary love language. It will be nice if I ever get the chance to do this with my wife but as of now that is not a valid possibility. My primary was Physical Touch and my secondary was tied between Quality Time and Words of Affirmation. It was interesting but does not help to much right now.

I am moving on to a book called “Controlling People: How to Recognize, Understand, and Deal With People Who Try to Control You”. As always once I get over ½ way through this book I will post a review but this will take a bit longer than the previous ones as I now have college reading to content with.

[Nettles]

Hang in there soldier. W may not notice them yet, but there are improvements you've made that you are proud of, and you should be. Look at your first paragraph and think of which of those you would have tried 12 months ago. No matter the outcome, you've become a better person and father, and that is important.

Random thoughts from your post:

From what I've read in the threads, if you want more veteran comments from the likes of MrBond, Starsky and Sandi, you need to start screwing up more than you have. They seem to take the cases where the person has no clue and there is nothing you've posted to give the impression that you are off the rails. It's simply a hard situation.

Have you thought about sending W flowers for Mother's Day and have the card read like they were from your D? I don't think this would be pursuing. You would simply being helping D show love. If you have her before Sunday, have D write a card too. It isn't pursuing, but showing D that one can express love for someone, even if it is a trumped up holiday.

You wrote what your 'love languages' are? What are W's? How do they align with yours?

Lastly, what are your thought on the following as either an addition to the list or a slight edit of your #6 'Discovering how to enjoy the small things':

Discovering what is truly important in life.

[soldier]

Hey Nettles,

Thanks for the feedback as usual. I am not too worried as to who posts on my thread and I can see what you are saying about vets reserving their limited time for situations where the person is not grasping the concepts of DB. It is still nice to hear you say that from your perspective I am not of the rails yet. I feel as if I am kind of going through the motions but I guess this is what being patient is all about.

As far as mother’s day goes I helped D5 pick out a small gift for mom and a card. We filled it out last night and set everything up in a little gift bag. Today was my last day with D5 until next week so I had to have it ready early so she could take it home to mom for this weekend. I also bought W a card and filled it out but I did not send it with D5 as I didn't want to get in trouble. I figure when the time is right I will give it to her belated.

I am not sure what my wife’s love languages are. I tried to figure it out on my own but with such a lack of communication for so long I have little clues to go off of. I asked her if she would be willing to take the online quiz and let me know and she said she would but that was almost a week ago and I didn’t want to push it. I was hoping to ask again during our second lunch sometime this week but she still has not reached out to me so I am guessing she has changed her mind about lunch at least for now.

I like the alteration to my number 6 on our list. I say we change number 6 to what you stated as it encompasses what my thought was while hitting much more at the same time.

I went to the doc today for some regular yearly stuff and he said I look healthier than he had ever seen me. I am waiting on blood work to come back but everything else looked great. I have a friend coming over to help me finish fixing my hot tub and am glad for this as I really want to soak in it some tonight. I also hope to do another small run tonight but we will see.

[soldier]

So this was a rough day for sure and probably some damage done to my sitch. I had a small email conversation with my W for which she started and within it she was mad at me because she found out about my North Carolina trip and that I hadn’t told her. There was a bit of admin but here is the highlights:
W: “Finally – as far as lunch goes, I mentioned last night that I cannot do it today as I am swamped with meetings. Now probably wouldn’t be a good time anyway as I’m not in the calmest of mindsets. Thank you for telling me about your trip to NC, although I don’t know why I had to drag it out of you. I’m not going to get started on that.”
Me: “I was not trying to hide NC from you. I just wanted to get out of the house for a bit and I didn't want you to be mad at me. Judging from your last email this has had the opposite effect and I should have just told you outright. I will keep trying and will never give up no matter how things are. I just need to work harder and get it done. I know what to do and the next time you come back to the house it will hopefully be in better condition. Please don't worry about cleaning the house on your weekend with Ashrei. I will get it taken care of. I promise.”

Me: “Did you ever take that love languages quiz? I am really curious as to what you found out if you are willing to share.”

W: “Now – back to the current convo. The frustration is bc I has to dig and I always wonder why you make me do that. If you have just said it I wouldn’t have been so upset. But it was like I had to pry it out of you and bc of that it just was odd. The fact that you are going to NC, that you reached out to Paul after years of him trying to reach out to you…it’s all just a major change of direction. And then the fact you are doing it on mother’s day weekend and just logging 16 hours of drive time. I was a bit puzzled. I’m not mad that you’re getting out, and I don’t expect my rant to make a lot of sense, so I’ll hush.”

W: “I took the language of love quiz, but found it a bit narrow minded in how it approached things. Apparently today I am Acts of Service and Physical touch based, but that’s not too hard to figure out why. I think it’s a very situational quiz.”

Me: “Beth I would have never done something on Mother's Day if I thought for one second that you would like me there. You have given me no indication that this was the case. To be honest I don't feel like you really want me around for much of anything right now. I can only read the very few messages you send me and they are always pretty loud and clear. As far as why the change, I couldn't think of a better time for such changes and that is it. You are fine about speaking your mind about the house. It is my responsibility to keep up with it right now and I will. I come back Sunday and will start on these projects Monday after work. I will get it all taken care of. If you came over to do beds it would inadvertently hinder my time with Ashrei as I get to see you so little that it would pull my focus off of Ashrei while you were here. You are continuing to throw a lot of stuff at me between these last two letters and I am trying to do my best. I am sorry you did not enjoy the quiz. I thought it was fairly straight forward myself but I know you do not enjoy those quizzes. Ironically I can’t think of 2 items that I was more neglected of in our old relationship so maybe there is more to it then you are given credit for.”

Me: “No that when you slip back to the house whenever you want there are probably things I did not intend for you to see quite yet so I am sorry about that.”

W: “As I said – it wasn’t planned, but I realized I needed to drop off the check and didn’t have an invoice printed out, so I figured I would leave it with you. I ran upstairs to grab a few things from the bathroom, a ball cap, ash’s gardening gloves, my gloves, and my lifevest/outside stuff. She wants to camp outside. Figured I may try to make that happen as the weather gets nicer, even if it’s in the backyard. I didn’t dig through things and wasn’t trying to be noisy. I just was in and out. My apologies for no notice.”

Ok so way too much R talk and M talk and to pushy and too much pursuing. I know this for sure but I am very tired right now and this is when my emotions always get the best of my mind. This was all bad enough but then after work I asked if she could stop by the house real quick to give her a Mother’s Day card and gift. So ya I pretty much said screw it if you are going to blow yourself up you might as well go all the way.

She came to the house but wouldn’t look me in the eye. She told me that every time she has some good news I seem to want or need something that keeps her from enjoying it. I ask what her news was and she explained that she got the job I had helped her get and it came with a very large pay raise. I told her I was sorry that the site of me made it impossible to enjoy good news and let her leave.

So ya a bad day for me. I hope everyone else is doing better and I will get back on the horse tomorrow.

[Nettles]

Hang in there soldier. It is a rocky road. Get out your list of success to get you on the horse. Hopefully this pushes your thread back up and vets like Starsky, MrBond, or Sandi will respond.

[soldier]

Well my trip to North Carolina was very nice. I saw one of my old war buddies and we got to see good old Fort Bragg again for the first time in over a decade. I left feeling really good and the change of scene was wonderful.

I got back into town around 3 in the afternoon on Mother’s Day and I had bought a small stuffed bear for W and D5 while on post. Friday night me and W had talked about if I came into town early enough I might be able to stop by for Mother’s Day and she sounded fairly excited about it. Once in town I park close by to where W was staying and gave her a quick call. It went straight to voice mail and I left a brief message. I waited in the parking lot for 15 minutes and decided to drive over real quick to drop off the gifts.

My wife was not pleased with this at all. I had obviously misinterpreted her communication last Friday and without telling everything I walked away with some answer that I really needed. We did take the opportunity to talk and she explained to me that she does not trust me and although she cares about me as a father and friend she is not sure if she still cares about me as a husband. She said she was afraid of me on all fronts mentally, physically and emotionally and that it was this fear that causes her to send out the mixed messages as she is too afraid to tell me no outright so she leads me on to accommodate me. She also let me know that she does not trust the changes that she has seen in my at all and thinks that I am simply so controlling that I am using this change as a tactic to get another chance to hurt her.

So what does this mean from my point of view? Well I have foolishly allowed myself to build expectation with my spouse because of her communications that where made primarily out of fear. I have moved to fast for her and have pushed too much change in her direction. Even though I did not ask her to notice change, I changed so fast that to her it feels fake. I need to give her total and complete space now and not read anything into her communications moving forward. I am kind of back at step 1 but on a positive I have better footing this time around. I have went back and re-read my old posts and saw that I was starting to get somewhere but lost my patience. I am going to take this as a new beginning and be more patient this time. I have outlined a 4 month plan moving forward and will stick with it at all costs. I will stay consistent in my change as the change is really helping me personally and I want this change badly.

I am tired of messing this up so much over and over again and maybe Mother’s Day was the last eye opener I need to stop messing things up.

[Nettles]

soldier, it does sound like you need to remove the pressure, give W space and let her come to you. Oddly, in my sitch, PO may have helped because it meant no contact at all by me. But W still got info about me during this time, by things I did and didn't do. It also put me in the mindset that M was over. I hoped for a different outcome, but expected it to end in D.

Your W will get info about you as you give her space.

And patience is so hard to practice. But it is part of the path to regaining W's trust. First she must want to trust, then she must feel confident that she can trust. Neither phase is short. I know from my sitch that having the first does not resolve the second.

Where is this legally soldier? I went back and skimmed thread, but am not sure. Has D paperwork been filed? Any Ls involved?

Hang in there.

[soldier]

As of now there is no official legal action on either of our sides that I know of. She may have went to see a lawyer but I wouldn't know for sure so I will say she hasn't. She told me her current plan is just to keep finishing up school and what not. Kind of like she wants everything to remain normal except with me away from her.

[Nettles]

soldier,

Just my $0.02, but something wasn't adding up for me on the no L front, so I went back through you sitch. You seem confident that there ins't OM, so why hasn't W filed or even seen L? Then I found this in your post from 5/6 from W: "Believe it or not, I miss you too and although I’m still working through things on my end, I haven’t given up."

Unless there is a lot of missing information on your sitch, you haven't written that W said she was done, she hasn't file, she hasn't seen L. W even wrote that she's 'working through things on my end'.

Your GALing seems to be going well. Space and patience are needed. Keep rereading that response. She has to go through it, but there is a lot of hope there. Let her. And maybe cut down the content of your email and conversations with her? Try to target 3 sentences. Quick and concise. That's all she needs.

[soldier]

Thanks Nettles. As always you have helped me to keep things in a better perspective. I have been one hundred percent honest about everything thus far within my sitch and often quote email verbatim and sometimes it takes an outside set of eyes to show you what is right under your nose. My sister said something very similar to what you had wrote and she didn’t even know as much as you do about the sitch. She simply said that W had not filed yet and if she really wanted to she would have. It is obvious that something is still keeping her from pulling the trigger so for that I am thankful. I know W is not ready to trust me right now and this will take quite some time to gain back. I agree with you that Patience is my only answer right now.

On the GAL front I am now only 4 pounds away from a total weight loss of 50 pounds and all the guys at work have told me I am looking really in shape. I started jogging a while back and am quickly building up my lug capacity to the point where I am sitting at about 2 miles at a time right now. I bought some kind of a vaporizing e cigarette so that I could finish kicking the smoking habit I picked back up after W left. I signed up for a 5k fun run at the end of the month called the Neon Dash which is a night run where everyone gets covered in this glow in the dark paint and runs around. I found a club that does hiking all around my area and it is free. You just show up and hike. I started lifting weights again to get some better arm muscles. Lastly I found a mixed martial arts gym literally down the street from me and they specialize in Gracie style Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. When I was in the military I took the level 1 Army combative program which uses many of the same techniques as the Gracie Jiu Jitsu and I got to be fairly good at it. I use to go to open mat events and test out my skill level and rarely did I loose. I thought that getting back into this, now that I am getting into shape, might help to rekindle that old me that I lost somewhere.

I have an IC session tonight and I hope to talk more about dealing with anger as I think I have closed off most of my emotions to the point that anger was the only one I would allow out. As a result I think that whenever I felt something other than anger I would always manifest it as anger instead of what was really going on inside. I have been working hard to learn to understand all of my other feelings and manifest them appropriately but this is still very hard and I think better anger management would help to aid in this.

Nettles if you read this and don’t mind sharing could you tell me what the class you signed up for is about. I can’t remember the name of the class but it was something like a battery intervention. I was wondering if this might also be a good thing for me or not.

[Nettles]

soldier,

Patience is a hard thing. You know how I love Buddhist philosophy, and they believe it must be practiced constantly. That should tell you how easy it is to have, so don't beat yourself up for not having it. Just keep trying.

I loved the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu comments. S12 and S10 take it now. I used to hate taking them to it, but now jump at the chance. The owner wants to know when I'll start practicing, but am too old. I'll tell him you are gonna practice for both of us!

With respect to the class I'm taking, it is part of the BIPPs (Batterers Intervention and Prevention Program) offered by Texas. The provider must meet various criteria set up by Texas. You can google the term to find out more about the what and the why.

I need a few more sessions to determine the value of the course. Initially I was concerned, but we have recently moved to productive activities. I'm the only participant that wasn't arrested and ordered to the class by the court. From what I've seen, there is a lot of guilt and anger for the participants. Let me go to a few more classes before recommending it.

Has W said anything about you being abusive soldier?

[soldier]

She did not say anything about me being physically abusive but it was strongly indicated that I was emotionally abusive to the point that she was afraid of me. Even though the abuse was emotional she also confessed that she worried it might turn to physical. This is strange to me because she still lets me have a week at a time with D5 and I would think that if she truly thought me to be manifesting anger to a point where physical abuse could be present that she would not want my around D5. I have never hit my wife and outside of some small spankings I have never hit my daughter but regardless of this my W is afraid of me which makes me want to try to find something that I can do to help ease this fear.

I found in a different post on these forums a site called MEVAC – Men Ending Verbal Abuse and Control and have petitioned to become a member. It is another forum like this DB forum and I think there will be some great information on it. The bottom line is that I want to find a great since of inner peace and I want to have a calmer more enjoyable life moving forward. I love and miss my wife and it would be great to have a new life with her but I no longer expect this to happen. I say this because more than a want for my wife to return and us to start again, I want to not hurt my relationships in the future. I am tired of the pattern of negativity in my life. I am on a positive route now and I am focusing hard on making sure I do not backslide again.

This is going to sound negative but I have really come to terms with the fact that if my wife is afraid of me she will most likely never feel a desire to return to me. This doesn’t mean that I give up by any means but it is a harsh realization that I need to face. My W does not want to work on the M at all and she is very uncomfortable in my presence. I have given her complete space and silence since the fiasco on Mother’s Day and plan to keep it up until she reaches out to me if she even does. In the meantime everything I do now is for me or my D5 and no one else as I expect that there will be no W moving forward. Maybe I will be pleasantly surprised but my heart tells me that my W ever returning is a fairly long shot. That being said I have made some pretty difficult shots in my day so I still have a bit of hope but in a more realistic way now.

[soldier]

One last blurb Nettles, I will be glad to train enough for both of us. I am super amped and I go to my first introductory class tonight after work. Once I get settled in and can participate in some open mat nights I will try to get a submission on someone for you

[soldier]

Well it has been a few days now so I thought I would post. I have been almost completely silent with my W for the last entire week from Mother’s Day to today. Our only exposure was a school function for D5 in which we shared no more than 30 words for the entire 3 hour event. She never reached out to me about the lunch she said might be nice so I let it go. So now I am starting another week of silence and it is surely killing me. Often times it is just me here at the house and it is lonely. I am thankful for the weeks when I have my daughter here as it offers some comfort from the loneliness but this is only for a week at a time. I feel more like my wife is being silent to me than the other way around.

I am GALing so much that I am running out of things to do and these also offer distraction but not comfort. I am hitting up my fighting classes 3 days this week and running 2 days and doing yoga 4 days. I have a lunch planned with my brother and some pants shopping as well. I have some stuff around the house planned as it is falling behind a bit and this will probably fill my entire week along with my master’s class and self-help reading/note taking. There are not enough hours in the day. My sister keeps reminding me that W has not yet filled for D and that I should be thankful but I miss her so much and she really is my best friend.

Ok enough of my venting and sadness. I guess I will concentrate on my working out hard this week and really try to destroy my body some. I know this sounds bad but I actually enjoy this feeling as it reminds me of when I was still in the military. I have hit a plateau with my weight loss which is to be expected as I am building quite a bit of muscle mass. It is still coming off but it has slowed down considerable. This is ok to me because my body looks and feels overall better. I went to the big and tall store the other day for pants and could not get them there as they did not carry my size. My size was too small and they said I would need to go to a regular retail store for that small a waist. This made me feel good.

I am still waiting for full permissions to the MEVAC forums I talked about. I really want to read through that good material and start what the call a daily regiment but have not been able to get the access yet. I really hope it comes in the week. I am so excited about finally being able to understand why I fail at relationships and maybe even with much hard work being able to get rid of some or all of this weight that I keep holding onto.

I am half way through the book “Controlling People: How to Recognize, Understand, and Deal With People Who Try to Control You”. I have found this to be a really eye opening book for me as I do feel that I have a controlling personality and have been verbally abusive to my W. This book focuses largely on explaining how this behavior comes about and how we can be disconnected or “built backwards” in the way that we handle relationships. If anyone does read this book then when they get to the teddy bear example the within it they will know what I am talking about but suffice it to say that this example hit really close to home for me and how I treated my W.

[soldier]

Well I have my second fight class tonight and am looking forward to rolling around on the mats with some guys and letting off some steam. I worked out for about an hour last night and it left me wanting more. Sometimes I wonder if this new obsession with my health and fitness is just something to feel the void of missing my wife but it is working so I will go with it.

There has still been no word from the W and probably not going to get one for a while so I am working on exercising my patience. Without attempting to mind read I feel as if this is a test of sorts. She set up boundaries for me on Mother’s Day and she now wants to kick back and see if I can truly respect them or not. I will not fail this time around as I know have a better understanding of exactly how my wife feels right now.

I have been working on empathy a lot and really trying to see things from other people’s points of view every day. I played with my D5 last night and it was really wonderful to just be able to relax and live in the moment. I know I was controlling and trying to let go of that lifelong habit has been hard and has felt very foreign to me but every time I succeed in doing it I walk away feeling very positive about what I have accomplished. I know I have a long way to go but I just want to keep taking steps in that direction as fast as I can. The truth is that I want my W back but I want to not be this controlling guy far more. I am starting to slowly transition doing things for my W to doing things for me. I know I should have been in this mind set all along but in the early stages I just wanted to do what I could to get my W to come home. Now I am starting to see that this will not happen any time soon but the change is needed regardless. I am not completely there yet but again I feel much closer to this thought process.

I am going over to my dad’s this weekend to power wash his house for him and I thought I might just do mine as well. We get a lot of pollen and knocking it off would be nice. I have a class project to work on some this weekend but if I get it caught up in time I also hope to give our flower beds some much needed love. I have never cleaned out flower beds before as this was always the W’s thing so it should be a novel experience but I am going to dive in with both hands, pun intended, and try to live in the moment and clean those beds the best I possible can.

[Nettles]

soldier, just read you post to my thread. Our sitches are different. Don't give up. I'm worried you are losing hope. As I wrote over there, don't expect anything, but don't lose hope.

I really admire the work you've done. Regardless of outcome of M, if you keep being the best dad you can be, the return from D's love will be immeasurable. I have 3 boys and 1 girl, and it is different. I love my Ss, but there is nothing like my D. There is nothing anyone, including W, can do to take that away from you.

[soldier]

Hello Nettles, I wanted to thank you again for you words of encouragement on my thread and on yours. I am not giving up all hope by any means. I have realized that I am a Verbal Abuse and Control (VAC) abuser and that for many years I have never physically hit my wife but still abused her in a way that most think is even worse. I have switched over to the MEVAC forums and have found much good information over there to help guide me down the path of correcting this core problem. When I made this discovery I realized that my sitch is very different than the ones that are her on the divorce busting forums in that abuse is involved. I still enjoy posting here and it was through these forums that I learned about VAC and MEVAC and for that I am truly grateful. Right now what is most important is for me to learn to completely stop this VAC behavior and this is a lifelong pursuit similar to if I was a recovering alcoholic. I guess in DB terms I have used VAC recovery as a major part of my GAL but I no longer do these things for my W. I am doing them for myself which I should have been doing this all along. I will still post here but my focus is much different now. I will stay strong and continue to change my improperly learned behaviors. It may allow healing for my W and will definitely provide healing for me in the process. In this type of abusive relationship it is rare that reconciliation happens but not unheard of. I will continue to try with my W but I am learning empathy for what I have put her through. If she heals enough and can forgive then there is always a chance but it is still important to realize that there are no promises. I guess this is life in general though. I have enjoyed out friendship on these forums and look forward to hearing your continued progress but my path is somewhat transcending merely DBing now. I have a problem and I need to address that first and foremost. Now my DBing is me recovery from VAC and this is a strange road indeed. For any who might read this and wonder if this is there issue as well. If you truly want to open your eyes for the first time then please read a book by Patricia Evans called Controlling People. It will explain everything at a basic level about VAC.

[Nettles]

I wish you the best soldier. No matter the tool, I think improving ourselves is the focus. I'll check out Controlling People as I'm sure it could help me too.

I'll post the quote I put in my first post on your thread from my tool: "No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path." - Buddha

And it seems you've found your path.