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Joined: May 2016
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I ended up deciding it felt more natural to give a friendly-but-not-overly-enthusiastic hello/good morning/goodbye where called for rather than a literal interpretation of never speaking unless spoken to.

Beyond the salutation however, I leave it to my wife to create interactions if she chooses to.

After days of almost no contact since confronting WW on May 17 (no texts, very little convo, and me being very busy with other activities) WW has been initiating much more these past couple days. She also gave me a compliment about my improved level of drive, and has asked me a couple times about my upcoming birthday weekend plans.

I'm validating but working hard not to seem overly enthusiastic and not to ascribe meaning to her words. She has continued to have very limited and mundane online contact with OM lately, but has not actually committed to ending things, or wanting to fix things, or expressing more remorse, or anything of that sort. This could easily be nothing, or even worse could be her just "temp checking" and throwing out some pleasantries to keep me locked in as a plan B.

Trying to walk the nuanced line between not ignoring her and being upbeat/friendly, while still giving her opportunities to realize what she will be losing if she continues her path. Gotta plan some sort of away-from-the-house GAL activity for tomorrow night.


Me, WW - Upper 30s
BD - Apr 1 2016
EA - Apr 7 2016 (discovered; ongoing for months; did not confront right away)
Confronted wife about EA - May 17
Wife sent NC email to OM - July 11
Joined: May 2016
Posts: 172
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WW continued the onslaught of interactions last night, both during our mutual martial arts classes and afterwards. Lots of short dialogues, mostly mundane, all cordial; me mostly just listening/validating. A couple things that came across as thoughtful, like her offering to get me aspirin when she got up to get herself some (heavy sparring at Martial arts last night), or mentioning she had gotten more turkey bacon for me.

Despite that, still no real changes in actions on her part or any actions to commit to reconciling. Trying not to interpret her words/actions and just detach, but feel I have to assume she is just trying to keep all her options open until I see consistent actions otherwise.

I told her this morning I would like to refinance the house to save money on payments, and would like to start gathering the info the bank needs tonight (I had been holding off on refi because we had been considering selling for some time, but I realized locking it in now at better interest rate will make it more practical for me to stay in the house if we split, so I can find a new place if desired at my convenience.) She said it sounded like a good idea.

Yesterday she said goodbye to me; this morning she said goodbye to the cats. Her mood all over the place.


Me, WW - Upper 30s
BD - Apr 1 2016
EA - Apr 7 2016 (discovered; ongoing for months; did not confront right away)
Confronted wife about EA - May 17
Wife sent NC email to OM - July 11
Joined: May 2016
Posts: 172
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Planning to visit family one of the days for my birthday weekend. Not inviting the wife, and if she asks to go I plan to tell her no. Not sure how to say it though, in a constructive way without it sounding punitive.

Things with OM seem to be sputtering out, but she has not broken off contact with him. So I don't really want her with and don't feel like putting on a show for the family.


Me, WW - Upper 30s
BD - Apr 1 2016
EA - Apr 7 2016 (discovered; ongoing for months; did not confront right away)
Confronted wife about EA - May 17
Wife sent NC email to OM - July 11
Joined: May 2016
Posts: 172
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WW was in a fender bender Friday. Apparently she had been coming to bring me a surprise birthday treat at work when she rear-ended someone because of wet roads. The thought was nice; of course then she ruins the gesture by complaining (to me and facebook) that "she knew she shouldn't have come, and should've just took a nap like she planned." Her ongoing narrative is that whenever she tries to do something nice for other people she gets [censored] on and so she should just be selfish.

Had a really good solo trip\visit with family. Almost broke into tears a few times... On the drive down and when people asked Qs re what the wife was up to, but kept it together. Despite the rough feelings, got a bunch of quality visiting in. The drive home was a lot easier than the drive down and I was in a lot better mood and have been able to stay pretty upbeat even once home.

WW was fairly amiable when I got home this evening. I mentioned I was going to get groceries and we ended up going together. A fair amount of casual conversation. I'm pretty sure she is giving signals that she would be open to sex. Very tempted, but resisting so far. Wish this could just be a normal birthday...


Me, WW - Upper 30s
BD - Apr 1 2016
EA - Apr 7 2016 (discovered; ongoing for months; did not confront right away)
Confronted wife about EA - May 17
Wife sent NC email to OM - July 11
Joined: Jan 2016
Posts: 1,091
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EDF,

Keep it up and stay strong. From what you are posting things seem to be moving in the right direction. Happy Birthday. Don't give in to the sex. She needs to feel the emptiness of not having an H.


H-46 XW-38 T-7 M-6
S-9,8,8,6,4
S 11/30/15, I filed 12/8/15
EA 2/1/16 D dismissed 3/24/16
PA 3/18/16 confirmed 4/22/16
XW files for D 4/1/16 - D final 11/17/16
Finally moving forward...
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Wife got me a birthday card and left it out for me to find. Message inside was "hope you had a relaxing day", signed with her name and the cats. Just names, no "Love,". Not reading anything into it.

Weird day overall. She seemed to alternate between distant and friendly. We each did some of our own stuff, we went for a walk together, had some pizza and watched TV together. It's a weird sort of dance where we generally don't really invite each other but one will say they're doing something and perhaps the other says something ambiguous like "that sounds nice" or "I had been thinking of taking a walk later too", and then the other might mention it again with wording that is leaving the door open without quite being an invite, and the other person maybe tags along.

It goes in both directions. I try hard to not always bite when she leaves a quasi-invite and try to do plenty of my own GAL stuff without her but I don't want to completely shut her out since she has had much less contact with OM; only sporadic mundane messages. That's how I rationalize it to myself at least I guess.

I feel I struggle at some elements of detaching, but other aspects I've been solid. Haven't initiated a text or phone call to her since... At least a month. Haven't initiated any physical contact since I confronted her about A. Haven't had any R talks since early April when I started DBing.

I'm doing better at not snooping, and have been going 2-3 days at a time without, but still a work in progress.


Me, WW - Upper 30s
BD - Apr 1 2016
EA - Apr 7 2016 (discovered; ongoing for months; did not confront right away)
Confronted wife about EA - May 17
Wife sent NC email to OM - July 11
Joined: May 2016
Posts: 172
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Went for a nice solo jog after work, which felt good.

WW has her iPad covertly angled away and appears to be looking at apartments (She's not very good at the whole "covert" thing). Doesn't appreciably change what I need to do over the long run so trying to not let it get me down, although it probably reinforces that I have been falling for more cake eating than I should have.


Me, WW - Upper 30s
BD - Apr 1 2016
EA - Apr 7 2016 (discovered; ongoing for months; did not confront right away)
Confronted wife about EA - May 17
Wife sent NC email to OM - July 11
Joined: May 2016
Posts: 172
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Wife called me after work, on the verge of tears. The auto shop where we took her car after her fender bender hasn't looked at her car yet. They had told her they would look at it Tuesday, but today when she called they instead said they were waiting for her to call them back before looking at it for some reason. She's had a rental car for several days and they haven't even looked at her car yet.

I just listened and validated while she complained about the auto shop and how that's just her life now with "everyone but her trying to [censored] her over". I was very tempted to offer help like I normally would... Offer to help her find different auto shop, or reassure her we can keep the car rental longer if needed, etc, but I held my tongue.

So many of these sorts of problems I've always made go away for her, but while she wants to keep all her options open she can deal with her own problems.


Me, WW - Upper 30s
BD - Apr 1 2016
EA - Apr 7 2016 (discovered; ongoing for months; did not confront right away)
Confronted wife about EA - May 17
Wife sent NC email to OM - July 11
Joined: May 2016
Posts: 172
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Had a really great night at Martial Arts. Tonight was kinda stressful because it was a fight night (100% strength sparring) we've been building up towards the last few months. WW is also in the martial arts class, and had invited some friends (ladies) to watch her fight. So I started today with all sorts of performance anxiety from multiple angles, in addition to the normal R stress.

However, wrote out a game plan and committed to just doing my best and enjoying it; avoided making it about my W and trying to impress her or not look like a chump in front of her friends... being gracious and a good sport regardless of how I performed.

And I feel like I nailed it. I was upbeat and sociable with people, enthusiastic about the rest of the team's fights, and enjoyed my turn in the spotlight.

I ended up performing well, W was friendly and introduced me to her friends, got a number of compliments on my fight, etc. But for perhaps the first real time the W niceness of the moment felt like it was coming from just another person, as opposed to my night being about her.

Hopefully this feeling lasts through tomorrow because I really need to get some more work done at work, which is the area I have been having the biggest struggles with.


Me, WW - Upper 30s
BD - Apr 1 2016
EA - Apr 7 2016 (discovered; ongoing for months; did not confront right away)
Confronted wife about EA - May 17
Wife sent NC email to OM - July 11
Joined: May 2016
Posts: 172
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Been letting WW deal with her own car problems after her fender-bender. However, now it looks like the damage is extensive enough to be effectively totalled and not worth fixing, so she will need a new car.

I feel like it would probably be appropriate to leave her to do her own car research/shopping/financing, and leave her to handle dealing with the totalled car.

However, we haven't really split finances yet. While she hasn't expressed remorse yet, things with OM have seemed to be petering out and I was kinda holding the "separate finances" thing as a consequence for if she re-escalated things with him.

Any thoughts how I should handle the situation?


Me, WW - Upper 30s
BD - Apr 1 2016
EA - Apr 7 2016 (discovered; ongoing for months; did not confront right away)
Confronted wife about EA - May 17
Wife sent NC email to OM - July 11
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