Newbie, need help with WAW! (Thread 2)

[sandi2]

Still no response from my W. Again, still okay with this

No, you aren't okay with it. At least, be honest with yourself. You've counted the days and considered every possible thought and reaction she might have........and you can't think of anything else to talk about b/c you've been totally focused on that darn letter! You wanted it to affect her and help your chances to R. Wasn't that your true motivation? At best, she will say she appreciates it........and that will probably be due to you prompting her. It was another attempt to add more emotional pressure, which is usually not received very well.

If you are reading this and considering writing an apology letter to your S, I would say take your time and make the words count. I

Make it count? Like in making it effective in affecting her emotions? Like the line you used, in spite of the coach's hesitancy? It is an apology! From what I've observed, most WW/WAW will say it's too little too late. I think it comes across as a con job from a man who uses emotional pressure on his W. That's what I see. You thought the letter would serve as a hook, and made it a form of pursuit.

[180Man]

Still no response from my W. Again, still okay with this

No, you aren't okay with it. At least, be honest with yourself. You've counted the days and considered every possible thought and reaction she might have........and you can't think of anything else to talk about b/c you've been totally focused on that darn letter! You wanted it to affect her and help your chances to R. Wasn't that your true motivation? At best, she will say she appreciates it........and that will probably be due to you prompting her. It was another attempt to add more emotional pressure, which is usually not received very well.

If you are reading this and considering writing an apology letter to your S, I would say take your time and make the words count. I

Make it count? Like in making it effective in affecting her emotions? Like the line you used, in spite of the coach's hesitancy? It is an apology! From what I've observed, most WW/WAW will say it's too little too late. I think it comes across as a con job from a man who uses emotional pressure on his W. That's what I see. You thought the letter would serve as a hook, and made it a form of pursuit.

I disagree. Day-to-day my emotions have felt mostly stable and I haven't been losing my mind like I was in the past. I AM okay with no communication right now. My letter was extremely sincere. I really did have an awakening last week to how I had treated her at times through the years. My true motivation was to apologize. If I had zero intent to rekindle my marriage, I probably wouldn't be here. I probably would have filed and went about my life. That path would have sucked, too, but I suspect I could be bar hopping several nights a week having fun. But I'm not doing that. I'm not doing that because I have a deep love for my wife and even though she fùcked up, so have I. I want to see if we can fix it. My letter was not a hook, it was an honest look at how I've hurt her and my apology for those things. It was sincere and from the heart. I asked nothing of her.

But what is any letter? Communication. Communication is a two-way thing, so yes, I do wonder how my communication was received and if it will be responded to. This is natural. Yes I want to communicate with her. Yes I want to fix my marriage. Implying I have some other secret sinister motive is not something I appreciate.

If she never responds, ignores what I've said, and has me served, that's her choice and, ultimately, her response to my apology. I don't think that will be the case, but who knows. But in the mean time, I am fine.

Before I sat down with my wife for coffee last week, Sandi, I read a ton of what you've written on these boards and took it to heart. It is very good advice for certain circumstances. That being said, I realized that in my situation, I am not in a position to take such a hard line toward my wife on everything. I have screwed up, too, and even though you may think an apology letter to my wife is a weak attempt to hook her into something, I think we can both agree that we are seeing things through our own filters. I will not be a push over and I am becoming a stronger man, but that does not preclude owning my own problems and trying to have honest communication with my wife. Not everything is black and white and, honestly, if we have zero communication...what's the point?

[180Man]

I was going to post earlier today to ask the question of what to tell friends. I decided against it. My DB coach said to tell as few people as possible thereby making it easier should she ever want to come home. I had been following this on my own already so it's nothing really new.

However, I went to have dinner with a buddy of mine tonight, he is in town for work for a couple months. He and his W used to lived here until a couple years ago and our wives were great friends. I have hung out with him a couple of times so far since he has been back out here but simply told him my W was swamped with work -- which is true. I never really talk about R stuff with my male friends anyways, so it's not like anything was different. Maybe I'm way off, but I'm certain 95% of men don't normally talk about R stuff. Either way, I figured if my W came up tonight I would just tell him we were having a hard time and leave it at that.

Well, turns out he already knew. Apparently my W has talked to his W at least a couple times, idk to what extent. He didn't say he knew any of the details, but he knew we were having trouble and didn't want to bring it up unless I did. Fair enough, I'd probably have done the same. I'm actually glad that my W has been talking to his W. I feel like she needs some girlfriend support like that from someone down to earth like my buddy's W. She really lost all of her college girlfriends over the years and didn't have much of anyone in town as far as females these last couple of years...I was worried about her in that regard before any of this happened.

So, anyways, I guess that's somewhat of a relief. I'm glad my W has some good support. I didn't get into any real details with my buddy but I'm glad I have him to lean on now if I need to. I think we're going to go hiking later in the week. I didn't tell him my W had an A. I didn't tell him she won't move home. I didn't tell him she wants a D. Just said that we had both fùcked up and that I want to work on it but it takes two. Told him I am trying to figure out what to do with the house. I don't think he knew it has gotten that far.

Today was hard, I have been taking everything out of the kitchen cabinets and cleaning top to bottom. I got bunch of cardboard boxes and started putting her stuff or things of ours that reminded me of her into the boxes. That was very hard. Talked to my mother, she's Ms. Narcissism. Somehow she keeps managing to make this about her. It drives me fùcking nuts. She also decided it was necessary to give me her analysis of my W and how she has always run from trouble, how she doesn't think she can handle this and is just running away, and that it sounds like my W has just made up her mind and is going to go on with the D no matter what.

Gee, thanks mom.

I do have the feeling my W has simply made up her mind and that's that. I think she cares for me and doesn't want to hurt me more which is why she wants to go through mediation instead of lawyers. I think that's really the only reason. I looked up the cost of a local mediator today -- $4k!! What?! Am I wrong to think she should pay for it because this will be her divorce, not mine?

I think I am DBing fairly well, but again I just don't think it's really going to change much on her end. I am doing my best to DB for ME, but at the end of the day I do want her to come home. It's hard to detach so much to the point where I just don't even care if she comes home or not...seems like that would be weird. Idk. Maybe I'm not DBing well, after all...

[180Man]

So...brother-in-law texts me this morning: "Hey can I bother you?"

Then an hour or so later MIL texts: "You might be the only person in the world who can help me with a problem that I have"

For background, BIL is harmless, he's a good kid just starting out in his career, when I last visited he asked if I could still be his brother (since he doesn't have any) even if things fall out with my W. Very nice sentiment but I'm not sure I'm strong enough for that.

MIL has told my wife she needs to grow up and strongly disagrees with my W's actions, to the point that (last I was in contact) they weren't even talking.

I haven't talked to her family for a month.

I'd really prefer not to get wrapped back up in her family's stuff right now, but then again, MIL's husband had a stroke two weeks after my W's BD. Not saying the BD caused the stroke, but it definitely didn't help. He was so upset at my W, he couldn't even sleep. Out of all the out-of-state kids, I was the only one to fly out the same day of the stroke and go help my MIL for a week. My W and SIL didn't fly out there until about a week and a half later due to work and only stayed a few days. I don't know what my MIL's husband's status is right now, I check google for obituaries every once in a while but I'm presuming he's still alive. It was a very bad stroke.

So anyways...do I respond? Ignore them? Some other option?

[Dawgs]

Blood is ALWAYS thicker than water. Remember that.

[LITB]

180,

Personally, this is independent of your M/R with your MIL. There is nothing wrong with checking on your MIL and the status on her husband. It isn't always black and white.

You can help people out without expectations.

[180Man]

Okay, thanks to both of you for the quick feedback, that helps. I'll check in and see what's up but will remind myself that I'm just water.

[180Man]

Well, turns out she just wanted help with her computer. Her internet went down when I was out there helping with her H's stroke and it happened again so she asked if I could help. She sent me some pictures of H's recovery, looks like he's slowly getting better, but I guess I can stop checking the obits.

After church yesterday I thought of reaching out to the pastor to see if he had time to talk one-on-one. I think I will, I think it will be good for me and help me work more on my spiritual side.

[LITB]

After church yesterday I thought of reaching out to the pastor to see if he had time to talk one-on-one. I think I will, I think it will be good for me and help me work more on my spiritual side.

I think that is a great idea. Let us know how it goes after you call this evening or tomorrow.

[180Man]

I emailed him, hopefully will hear back tomorrow. I'll let you guys know how it went.

Got a letter in the mail today from some random company. Their letter said that my W had filed paperwork for divorce two weeks ago (I presume this company is simply trying to solicit me for a lawyer referral by mining public records). To recap: We had coffee two weeks ago Monday, she said she wanted us to plan for mediation, she said she didn't want to serve me. That Tuesday she emails me thanking me for listening to her at coffee but still wants us to find a mediator. Wednesday she filed but didn't tell me. Friday I responded to her email with my apology letter to which I haven't heard anything back.

So...then I find out two weeks later from a third party company that she filed paperwork? I guess I should have expected her to follow through with paperwork, but you think she would have mentioned it at the coffee meeting..."By the way, I'm filing the paperwork this week."

I haven't been served and she's still paying half of the bills, so there's that. When I was a teenager and got into a minor 5mph fender bender the other driver tried to sue me and claimed he served me even though he hadn't. Do I need to somehow check to see if she has claimed to have served me? I doubt that is the case but I also didn't think I would be talking about divorce on the internet three months ago.

This really [censored]. I was going to go to bed early tonight and go to the gym at 5, but this spun me up when I opened the mail tonight. I guess it doesn't really change anything since I haven't been served and, presuming nothing false has been filed to the contrary, that means the clock hasn't started ticking. In our state I have to be served before the court will touch it and I have 30 days to respond once served. Then I guess it's 6 months until it can be finalized.

Does this change my approach of staying dark? Do I continue to wait for her to contact me regarding my apology email? Or do I ask her for another coffee meeting and give her another glimpse at how I'm changing, try to open up during conversation and hope she opens up too? If she was affected at all by my apology letter, a good meeting could fan the coals a little bit, right? If she was unaffected, I assume she would arrive expecting to talk about mediation.

What should I do??? I hate this.