Wife with Neighbor Across the Street

[Dawgs]

I feel that I do, but is it only to "keep the family intact" or because I want what I can have? I dont think so, but its possible.

Well, the first thing is this - why. And then comes trust. If you can't fully, 1000000% trust her when she is "running late" or some excuse, then there is a huge flag that needs to be dealt with.

I can understand keeping the family intact. Hell, I wanted the same thing. But, knowing that the level of disrespect that has occurred, you must also ask yourself this - are you willing to keep her around because of your memories of what she was or are you afraid of being alone? The love isn't there...no person who loved would do what she did.

Our son is not aware of what is going on. He will find out one day and that will suck.

He will. And it will more than suck.

[Gordie]

Do I want her back? I feel that I do, but is it only to "keep the family intact" or because I want what I can have? I dont think so, but its possible.

Our son is not aware of what is going on. He will find out one day and that will suck.

He's 12 and he may know more than you think he knows. The kids see and hear...everything.

[sellout]

Update: So I regrteed my action on not being intune with her at dinner the other night, not giving her a hug when leaving and texting her not to try and set anything up with me anymore. I texted her yesterdya afternoon to try and do a "re-do" and she said she would think about it. After about 2 hours she called me (not texted) and agreed to go. I decided to take her to a nice shopping area of town because I was looking for a shirt. Long story short, we happily shopped for 3 hours and had a great dinner. While walking back to the car she grabbed my hand and held it on the way to the car. We engaged in a long hug when dropping her off at her car. It was the best night we have had together in at least 3 months since all of this blew up. NOW HERE IS THE KICKER: she is still "confused" on what to do. She is admittingly going out with OM tonight for a date. I kept my composure and told her that I cant do anything about that and i can only control myself. Is she breaking or something else? We are less than three weeks away from the divorce. Thoughts?

[LH19]

She is cake eating and you texting her for a redo just set you back big time.

[sellout]

I hear you LH19. Hear me thought process though...I have been not been there for her for the 16 years of marriage. Absent, abandonment, etc... If i am to detach, isn't that more of the same behaviors? Also, how is she suppose to know what she wants if we NEVER see each other. She made the comment of she misses her husband and wanted to have a time where we could just sit and talk without any drama for once. That happened and felt really good. I understand what seems logical, but do you sometime need to go with your heart? Its not always as black and white as it seems. I would assume that within the next three weeks (until divorce date) the date I setup (she never would set a date), I will know where her heart is. IN the meantime I have to be a standup man, father and friend no matter what. No matter what happens, i must treat her with respect as she is the mother of my child and we will be connected for the rest of our lives. I think a "Semi-detachment" is what is in store for me at the moment. She has in the last week shared her breakdown moments with me, shared "our songs" with me, held my hand. Is that not showing that she is considering reconciling?

[LH19]

Read the post from Accuracy to Brizz. By far the best post I have read to date.

Very sorry for what you've gone through here, it's heartbreaking. You've done some things very well and handled the initial situation as well as can be expected. More recently however you're falling into a very familiar pattern that leads to a long period of pain and limbo.

Being in this situation is like dying of thirst floating on a raft in a poison lake. Everyone will tell you not to drink the water, and why you shouldn't drink the water, and what will happen to you if you drink the water. You can intellectually understand what they're saying, you "get it", you can convince yourself that you're not going to drink the water, but each night when you go to sleep and each morning when you wake up, you're thirsty as hell and the water is right there, so it's extremely easy to convince yourself that a little sip can't hurt. Despite the fact that you know you should not drink the water, you will just keep doing it because you keep convincing yourself its okay to do so because you're just dying of thirst.

So how do we bring that to your scenario? There is really only one prescription and that is to take the focus off of W entirely and focus only on you, your life, and what you want from it. Your learnings about what you need to improve about yourself are an asset you take with you, but everything else about W, what W is doing, what W is thinking, etc. needs to be entirely put aside.

You are not safe for her to approach until she feels you've let her go. That's a simple truth, but incredibly hard to accept.

Reaching out to W, making overtures, contacting W's family, talking to OM's W, snooping on W, this is all "drinking the poison water"

Why are you doing it? Why are you so obsessed with W? You were in a relationship with an LD woman who wasn't meeting your needs, who would irrationally blame you for anything that went wrong, and then cheated on you and lied to you. Why is that a prize worth making the focus of your waking attention?

The reason is that you are grasping to re-establish a feeling of control over your life.

When W cheated/left she ripped your sense of stability away from you. From your perspective you didn't do anything to deserve it, you couldn't stop it from happening, and you couldn't put things back together afterwards.

That would make anyone feel totally out of control, spinning down the drain, and that is a horrible feeling!

You are trying to analyze and understand everything so that you can build it into a rational model so that it will never, ever happen to you again. If I can avoid doing X, then Y will never happen. In addition, you want to unlock this puzzle, to deconstruct it so you can find the solution that will allow you to rebuild it. Finding that key would provide immense comfort.

Your brain has convinced itself that getting W back, or getting W to apologize and declare a desire to have you back is the very best and fastest way to restore your feeling of being in control.

With the benefit of time and distance, you'll realize that's what it's really all about, it's about regaining the ability to feel in control of your life and your future. It really has very little to do with W or who she is as a person, she's a lever to get you what you want, but that's really just an illusion.

You're dying of thirst (feeling out of control), and pursuing W is drinking the water out of the poison lake. You think it will satisfy your thirst each time you do it, but really it's just making you more sick.

We will tell you "don't drink the water!" Intellectually you'll agree, but the water is always there and logically it seems that drinking it is the shortest path to no longer being thirsty.

Instead, you need to paddle your ass to the shore, leave the raft behind, and get a drink somewhere else.

That's not code for having your own affair or finding a new woman to have a relationship with. It has to do with finding an authentic way to rebuild your feeling of being in control, controlling your own destiny and getting your mojo back.

If you take the focus off of W *completely* she will notice. That will give her space to breathe, and to think. That's the only way these things turn around -- the ONLY way.

Don't drink the water. I know it's right there. Don't drink it.

[sellout]

Good post indeed but not entirely accurate to my situation. I was/have been the one to mess over over time and she finally had her breaking moment and started her affair. Right for her to do...of course not? I feel she is finally seeing that what she is doing is wrong and could cost her the marriage, family, house, financial freedom, etc... I dont want to jeopardize her newfound thoughts with completely detaching. This would be another up/down that I have been putting her through the lst 2.5 months. Again, not justifying what she is doing but also need to be there for here when she is ready (just like she had been there for me the last 16 years when I continually screwed up). Im not going to shower her with gifts, etc... but if she calls, texts, I will answer and be nice. Does it feel I am playing 2nd fiddle or trying to get my "starting quarterback job" back...yes, and its a bad feeling but I think we may finally be making some progress. Why in the world would she want to spend 5 hours with me last night and hold my hand?




Should I want her back? I have put her though hell and back over a long period of time but we always held it together. Is what she is doing revenge? If so, can i ever forgive her?

[LITB]

sellout,

I just read through your thread. Vanilla posted to you on 2/25/17. I suggest you go back to read her post and respond to her questions.

You and your W both lack the relationship skills to overcome this RIGHT NOW. You say one thing and do another. There are no boundaries. You both demonstrate destructive behavior toward one another. Is this what you want to model for your S?

You filed for D a second time. That clearly came from a place of emotion. You both are inconsistent and confused based on what I have read thus far.

Tell us what your goals are to improve yourself.

How are you as a father?

Additionally, read the detachment thread that Cadet posted to you.

You have the ability to positively affect the outcome. It starts with you. You have to get yourself to a good place, before you can get your M/R to a good place.

[Mowgli]

sellout,

There are literally hundreds of us that felt the exact same way you do right now: We felt that we 'effd up our Marriages and we weren't there for our spouses, so we try to make up for lost time after the fact.

I'm so sorry to be the one to tell you this, brother, but it doesn't work that way. You can go back through my sitch and look at exactly what I went through, and what I was saying are exactly the same things you are saying right now. The difference is that my W hid the A, yours is flaunting it in your face.

She is setting you up for the "friend-zone."

I understand you don't want to believe these guys, but that is where you are heading.

It has to get worse before it gets better.

Scenario:

She calls and asks you to do something.

You say "Have you decided, or are you still hanging out with OM?"

She says "I don't know what I want."

You hang up.

Then she's going to throw all sorts of spew your way, telling you how lousy you are etc. She'll try to throw this guy in your face etc. It will be awful and you'll come back on here telling everybody how wrong we were about how to handle the sitch.

we'll tell you to stick to the script and it will get bad for a while, and then two things will happen:

1) By detaching and looking at this thing objectively, you'll realize that you can only be responsible for you, and you will figure out who you want to be and what you want to do. She may come back, she may stay with OM, she may move onto OM2, OM3, OM4, OM15, but you will be okay because you will be taking care of yourself and your son. Not your circus.

2) When you ghost her, she'll be livid at first, then she'll start to wonder why, then she'll start to wonder why you don't think she's good enough anymore. Now she's thinking about you and that's where you want her head to be. Any attention is good attention.

Here's the kicker in the whole process:

While she's putting all that focus on you, you're going to be just fricking lights out crushing life. You are not going to feel like doing any of this, but you are going to "fake it 'till you make it."

MOST IMPORTANTLY, YOU ARE GOING TO BE DOING IT FOR YOU!!!!!!!!

She will see the changes. She won't want to, but she will, and she will be mad!

she will say things like "Why now?"

You need to remember that it's her call, though. You can't manipulate someone back into your life; you have to make the changes because you want to, not because you're trying to "win her back."

[LH19]

Why in the world would she want to spend 5 hours with me last night and hold my hand?

So she can continue to sell OM and have you as plan B. "you can ignore reality but you can't avoid the consequences of ignoring reality".