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This has been a rough few weeks. Apologies for the wall of text here.

My W and I have been together for 14yrs and 8yrs married. We were pretty much high school sweethearts even though we never were there together because of the difference in grade level. I was initially friends with her brother and I would go to her parents house often and through the years I started to notice her and then told her I liked her a couple years later. We never really 'dated' per se but we always hung out. Her family moved to Utah from MN in '02, and we kept in touch. I decided to go on a church mission for 2 yrs (mormon missionary) and she waited for me. After I got back we dated and there was one point we broke up for 4 months because she wasn't sure about the future she wanted with me so she took some time from our relationship to think about it. We get back together and 6mos later I asked her to marry me. This is our pre-marriage story in a nutshell.

Throughout our marriage we always had few issues. Your typical issues early on in the marriage but she always complained about not having enough passion in the marriage. When we would have an argument, which was not that often btw, it was that issue that she always brought up which was the lack of passion in our relationship. I just never knew what real passion in a marriage was growing up, since my parents never showed in their marriage. My parents divorced when I was 16. So I thought the things I was doing, like working, being there for her, talking to her, was just enough. There was one time when she gave me a book on '1001 ways to be romantic' and I read it for the first few weeks and did a few things but I never really stuck with it, for reason I don't really know. Maybe I just thought I could just do them on my own and not need a book to tell me, I'm not sure.

I did have an addiction to porn which started very early on in my life and I feel that it has affected my abilities to maintain the passion and affection in our relationship, for reasons we are all to familiar with when pornography is mentioned. We had sex about 2-3 times a month consistently throughout our whole marriage. A few times we would go 1, almost 2 months without sex. I had this problem the whole time but was to ashamed and scared to tell her. It was only until this breaking point in our marriage 3 weeks ago that I had the courage to admit to her that I had this problem. She told me that regardless if I told her or not doesn't change the fact that she lost her love for me. She told me she would have helped me through it if it wasn't too late.

We just celebrated our 8yr anniversary (08/31/14) on a 7-day cruise in the western Caribbean. I thought we had a wonderful time and were connecting really well. We had sex 4-5 days of the 7 we were our there. I thought it was great. A week later her grandma died. She was somewhat close to her grandma (dad's mom) but her grief was not anywhere near where her dad was, but it was still tough for her. However I don't think it played any role in the issues of our marriage shortly thereafter. During that time I was there to console her and make sure she was doing ok.

We came back from the funeral in Utah and the first few days were fine, I felt like everything was going back to normal and I was doing a lot of things around the house and the day before we split up I just was really annoyed about the fact that I was doing everything around the house, like cleaning, taking care of the cats, dishes, while she did nothing. My mistake was that I was still very much dwelling within my ego and not thinking about how I should resolve this, so I distanced myself and she did the same thing.

The next day after work I just got fed up and right before things went down hill I was laying on the bed being distant and angry and she laid on me, kind of cuddling like trying to make me feel better but I sort of resisted and she backed away. At that point I think she had gotten angry and really distanced herself from me. After that, I decided we should get something to eat, I asked her if she wanted to come with and initially she said no but I told her I wanted her to come with me. It was during our time in the car when I told her I was mad that she was not doing anything around the house. Her response was that she didn't want to. Then I made the huge mistake of saying 'what should we do then? split up?' Which I completely regret because I said it out of anger/emotion and didn't know how she was going to take it. Then she asked why I kept bringing it up as a solution, which I might have said that a couple times before but mostly out of anger because I wanted her to say that it wasn't a solution. Then I asked if it would be better if we just separated and she said, 'Do you think it would be weird if I said yes'. My heart sank and I was feeling so many emotions at that point, anger, sadness, resentment etc. I said ok, I'll pack my things and stay at my moms house, so I did.

The weeks following, I did everything wrong. I wrote her a heartfelt letter, I begged, I pleaded, etc. I did find out about an EA. She told me she has been texting a friend from work and she told me it was sort of an EA. The day I found out, I texted her EA partner telling him to stop texting my W. I also told my W to stop texting him as well which mostly she did stop, however I know they talk at work. Then this past Saturday I found out she went to his house to 'play video games' and I confronted her through text. She called and we talked and brought up all the reasons why she wanted to divorce me again. Her EA partner is married and has 4 kids, one of them just born this past August, so I don't know what he see's in him other than he's giving her emotional support.

The past 3 weeks have been a rollercoaster. I just don't know whether to give up and let her go and continue with the 180s and GAL activies and move on. I've read DR and have been seeing a therapist, which helps. She doesn't want to go to MC but she did mention she wanted to do IC, but she hasn't scheduled anything yet. I'm sort of at a lost and starting to think there is nothing I can do.


Me:31 W:28
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T:14 M:8
BD:09/24/14
Separation 09/25/14
Joined: Jun 2008
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Sorry that you find yourself here. There are many things you can do to set your M straight. First things first. Have you read the DB or DR books?


M-43 W-40
2D - 9 and 5

Emotion, yet peace.
Ignorance, yet knowledge.
Passion, yet serenity.
Chaos, yet harmony.
Death, yet a new life.

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Oops just saw the part where you said you read DR. What changes have you made and besides passion, what other issues were there in the M?


M-43 W-40
2D - 9 and 5

Emotion, yet peace.
Ignorance, yet knowledge.
Passion, yet serenity.
Chaos, yet harmony.
Death, yet a new life.

RECONCILED AND WISER
Joined: Oct 2014
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dil Offline OP
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She hasn't told much of her family yet. She's only talked to her older brother briefly about it. She confides in a close coworker girlfriend who was also recently divorced (little over a year ago), which worries me a bit. However, she hasn't talked to any attorney yet.

I failed to mention that I also got the ILYBNILWY statement. She also mentioned early on that she didn't see a future with me and she wasn't sure that she could ever have that deep connection with me again, which really hurt.

There was a talk we had 1 week after the separation that I regretfully asked if there was any chance for reconciliation and she responded that it was an unfair question, which I understood after it was already too late.

In regards to the porn issue, I have since quit cold turkey last month and continue to avoid it, which has proven to be pretty easy so far. Since then I have felt a huge change in my attitude and confidence which is helping get through this.

I really do love my W with all my heart and still have a little hope that she might change her mind and decide to want to work things out. It is still early in the process so I do realize that I have to keep working on myself to change and become a better person. It definitely is tough going through the motions though.


Me:31 W:28
No Kids
T:14 M:8
BD:09/24/14
Separation 09/25/14
Joined: Oct 2014
Posts: 24
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dil Offline OP
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Originally Posted By: MrBond
Oops just saw the part where you said you read DR. What changes have you made and besides passion, what other issues were there in the M?


Some of the other issues we had were that we didn't resolve conflicts very well. Like I mentioned, I tend to distance myself from conflicts instead of talking through them. She always complained of her having to approach me every time I became distant after an argument. I do realize that and have reread DR, read articles and watched videos on how to better resolve conflicts within a R. I have applied some of those principles in the past couple chances I've had to communicate with her.

Even in the past I have tried to avoid becoming distant after conflicts, yet I fall back sometimes and forget, because I'm stuck in my ego trip.

I've been a keeping eye contact with her as I listen to her, validating her even if I don't tend to agree with something she said.

She did say that she loved everything about our marriage BUT the passion and affection part. This was her most important need that I was not able to fulfill consistently. With that I am currently taking an online course to help me work on that aspect.


Me:31 W:28
No Kids
T:14 M:8
BD:09/24/14
Separation 09/25/14
Joined: Oct 2014
Posts: 24
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dil Offline OP
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Just realized something that might be confusing. Of the 14yrs we've been together, 8yrs of those Married. Just had to clear that up.


Me:31 W:28
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T:14 M:8
BD:09/24/14
Separation 09/25/14
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Okay, so breaking things down... (just be forewarned that you may not like what you hear, but nonetheless, if you want to save your M, then you should look at all advice, especially those that you disagree with).

"but she always complained about not having enough passion in the marriage. When we would have an argument, which was not that often btw, it was that issue that she always brought up which was the lack of passion in our relationship."

That is a great straight up reason and a VERY important one.
I just never knew what real passion in a marriage was growing up,"

So? That's just an excuse. You could have learned about it when she brought it up to you. You just didn't think it was that important to you.

"since my parents never showed in their marriage. My parents divorced when I was 16. So I thought the things I was doing, like working, being there for her, talking to her, was just enough."

You're not your parents. You have control over your own life. Adding your parents in there is just an excuse.

"There was one time when she gave me a book on '1001 ways to be romantic'"

Wow that is a definite clue if I ever heard one and you ignored it.

"and I read it for the first few weeks and did a few things but I never really stuck with it, for reason I don't really know. Maybe I just thought I could just do them on my own and not need a book to tell me, I'm not sure."

No you were just lazy. It wasn't important to you, so you ignored it, therefore ignoring her needs. Your needs were more important to her than yours.

"I did have an addiction to porn which started very early on in my life and I feel that it has affected my abilities to maintain the passion and affection in our relationship, for reasons we are all to familiar with when pornography is mentioned."

That's a cop out. You could just as easily incorporated the porn into your romantic life. You could have tried new techniques on your W that you saw or learned how to seduce your W. You just didn't want to.

"We had sex about 2-3 times a month consistently throughout our whole marriage. A few times we would go 1, almost 2 months without sex. I had this problem the whole time but was to ashamed and scared to tell her. It was only until this breaking point in our marriage 3 weeks ago that I had the courage to admit to her that I had this problem. She told me that regardless if I told her or not doesn't change the fact that she lost her love for me. She told me she would have helped me through it if it wasn't too late."

And she was probably right. You're pretty young. Why didn't you have more sex?

"She was somewhat close to her grandma (dad's mom) but her grief was not anywhere near where her dad was,"

Why would you say something like that? Why compare her to her dad? She's your W and her grandmother died. Period. Do you honestly think that she shouldn't be as sad as her dad? It shows you don't understand her.

"but it was still tough for her."

Of course it was.

"However I don't think it played any role in the issues of our marriage shortly thereafter. During that time I was there to console her and make sure she was doing ok."

It played a big part. If you were off putting to her and not really understood how much the death affected her, it would show her that you didn't care. Or at least not care to the extent that she wanted.

"We came back from the funeral in Utah and the first few days were fine, I felt like everything was going back to normal and I was doing a lot of things around the house and the day before we split up I just was really annoyed about the fact that I was doing everything around the house, like cleaning, taking care of the cats, dishes, while she did nothing."

By that point she was already thinking of leaving.

"My mistake was that I was still very much dwelling within my ego and not thinking about how I should resolve this, so I distanced myself and she did the same thing."

Yes that is the worst thing you could have done. Do you normally distance yourself when there's conflict?

"The next day after work I just got fed up and right before things went down hill I was laying on the bed being distant and angry and she laid on me, kind of cuddling like trying to make me feel better but I sort of resisted and she backed away."

Wow you really hurt her. That's obvious. You acted like a spoiled child.

"At that point I think she had gotten angry and really distanced herself from me. After that, I decided we should get something to eat, I asked her if she wanted to come with and initially she said no but I told her I wanted her to come with me. It was during our time in the car when I told her I was mad that she was not doing anything around the house. Her response was that she didn't want to."

She's not your slave or housekeeper. She was going through alot of things. If she normally kept the house tidy and then she stopped, then you should have picked up the fact that there was something bothering her. And now look where it's gotten you. Now you're the one whose going to have to keep everything tidy all by yourself once she's gone.

"Then I made the huge mistake of saying 'what should we do then? split up?' Which I completely regret because I said it out of anger/emotion and didn't know how she was going to take it. Then she asked why I kept bringing it up as a solution, which I might have said that a couple times before but mostly out of anger because I wanted her to say that it wasn't a solution."

Why do you want to control her like that? When you kept saying that you would leave her, that took away her safety net that she had with you. No woman wants to go out with a guy that they feel is going to leave them at any time. In this case, you pretty much told her that you were going to leave her because she didn't clean the house for a few days.

Seriously?

"Then I asked if it would be better if we just separated and she said, 'Do you think it would be weird if I said yes'. My heart sank and I was feeling so many emotions at that point, anger, sadness, resentment etc. I said ok, I'll pack my things and stay at my moms house, so I did."

Well you did tell her that you would split up. She just finally stood up to you and called your bluff which you couldn't back up.

"The day I found out, I texted her EA partner telling him to stop texting my W. I also told my W to stop texting him as well which mostly she did stop, however I know they talk at work."

More control on your part. You want to control every part of her life it seems. Her cleaning, her life, etc.

"Then this past Saturday I found out she went to his house to 'play video games' and I confronted her through text. She called and we talked and brought up all the reasons why she wanted to divorce me again. Her EA partner is married and has 4 kids, one of them just born this past August, so I don't know what he see's in him other than he's giving her emotional support."

Really? You don't see it? Emotional support IS A BIG THING! And it's something that you've shown that you didn't want to give her before. Let's put it this way. She chose a M'd guy with 4 kids OVER you. This says less about her and more about the kind of situation you created for her that made her choose that over you.

"The past 3 weeks have been a rollercoaster. I just don't know whether to give up and let her go and continue with the 180s and GAL activies and move on. I've read DR and have been seeing a therapist, which helps. She doesn't want to go to MC but she did mention she wanted to do IC, but she hasn't scheduled anything yet. I'm sort of at a lost and starting to think there is nothing I can do."

There's plenty you can do. First thing is to grow up. You are going to have to learn to understand her emotional needs. REALLY understand them and start showing compassion and understanding. It seems like you have a hard time doing that and put yourself first.

Are you willing to change?


M-43 W-40
2D - 9 and 5

Emotion, yet peace.
Ignorance, yet knowledge.
Passion, yet serenity.
Chaos, yet harmony.
Death, yet a new life.

RECONCILED AND WISER
Joined: Sep 2013
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A couples things I'd like to add:

1

2-at all times, you must GAL and do 180 whether you move on or not. This is about you becoming a better you, she will either respond or she won't and then you can cross that bridge when you reach it.

3-i don't think living with your mother is the right scenario here. Seems like you're old enough to be out on your own.

Last edited by Cristy; 10/20/14 10:49 PM. Reason: per forum agreement, do not mention other websites, books and/or authors

Resentment occurs when we aren't doing what we need to care for ourselves, though we expect others to do it for us.
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dil Offline OP
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MrBond, Thank you for that dose of reality. It was really hard to read every one of your replies but I really do see it as constructive criticism, which I do need.

In my mind I seem to have to make excuses or give myself reasons as to why these things are happening. I guess its my way of coping with the situation.

Quote:

"since my parents never showed in their marriage. My parents divorced when I was 16. So I thought the things I was doing, like working, being there for her, talking to her, was just enough."

You're not your parents. You have control over your own life. Adding your parents in there is just an excuse.

I think I just subconsciously tried to treat my relationship how my parents did when growing up, not realizing that what they were doing, my dad specifically, did not work out in the end.

Quote:

"However I don't think it played any role in the issues of our marriage shortly thereafter. During that time I was there to console her and make sure she was doing ok."

It played a big part. If you were off putting to her and not really understood how much the death affected her, it would show her that you didn't care. Or at least not care to the extent that she wanted.

This one cut to the core. I don't believe I was off-putting at anytime during or right after the funeral but I definitely showed her I cared and that I was there for her. But yes, to a certain extend she may have wanted me do more to show her I cared.

Quote:

"My mistake was that I was still very much dwelling within my ego and not thinking about how I should resolve this, so I distanced myself and she did the same thing."

Yes that is the worst thing you could have done. Do you normally distance yourself when there's conflict?

I have in the past and I was actively working on avoiding that behavior even before the BD. It was one of the slip-ups I had and it came back to bite me for the worse.

Quote:

She's not your slave or housekeeper. She was going through alot of things. If she normally kept the house tidy and then she stopped, then you should have picked up the fact that there was something bothering her. And now look where it's gotten you. Now you're the one whose going to have to keep everything tidy all by yourself once she's gone.

She didn't normally keep the house clean, it was mostly me, but I did mention to her once that it made me feel loved when she helped me once in a while around the house. Again, you're right that I didn't pick up that there was something bothering her and rather than distancing myself, I should have approached her lovingly to find out what was bothering her.

Quote:

Really? You don't see it? Emotional support IS A BIG THING! And it's something that you've shown that you didn't want to give her before. Let's put it this way. She chose a M'd guy with 4 kids OVER you. This says less about her and more about the kind of situation you created for her that made her choose that over you.

I am realizing this more than ever. Its not that I didn't know that it was important before, like you said earlier, I placed my needs above hers, which was not the right thing to do.

Quote:

There's plenty you can do. First thing is to grow up. You are going to have to learn to understand her emotional needs. REALLY understand them and start showing compassion and understanding. It seems like you have a hard time doing that and put yourself first.

Are you willing to change?

I do need to grow up. Reading DR has really helped me how to show more compassion when comes to the needs of my W. I think that I definitely need to get rid of my controlling habits and start focusing on how I need to improve myself to rise above that trait.

Again THANK YOU for your feedback, it has woken me up a bit and made look at myself differently on what I need to do to make this change. I am willing to change, and I am willing to do anything I can to make them and KEEP them.


Me:31 W:28
No Kids
T:14 M:8
BD:09/24/14
Separation 09/25/14
Joined: Oct 2014
Posts: 24
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dil Offline OP
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Originally Posted By: 2stubborn2quit
A couples things I'd like to add:

1-

2-at all times, you must GAL and do 180 whether you move on or not. This is about you becoming a better you, she will either respond or she won't and then you can cross that bridge when you reach it.

3-i don't think living with your mother is the right scenario here. Seems like you're old enough to be out on your own.


2stubborn2quit, Thanks for your suggestions!

(1)

(2)Its been tough but I'm still continuing to GAL and 180. I do have to look at my 180s again to make sure I'm making progress on them.

(3)My wife is staying at our house that we had newly built and I currently cannot afford to get my own place or go to a hotel/motel for that matter, so my moms place was the only viable option at this time.

Last edited by Cristy; 10/20/14 10:51 PM. Reason: per forum agreement, do not mention other websites, books or authors

Me:31 W:28
No Kids
T:14 M:8
BD:09/24/14
Separation 09/25/14
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