You really think she's acting as a married woman on this trips.
Never underestimate a WW's capacity for not following through. She likely will not file. That's the way 95% of these cases go.
So I expect her to act like a separated woman. Talking, having fun all good...breaking trust in a marriage, no good. I will be AMAZED if she does not file. As she seems hell bent on D, why would she not?
Originally Posted By: ballast
So now I guess she'll be divorcing me.
I used this language as I do not as yet want to divorce. At least not until we really given our separation and R a real chance. I could get control back by filing myself.
Acc your comment on who they are vs who we want them to be. When I married her I thought I knew who she was. Now she is who I don't know. And now I want her to be who she was. Not like I had ANY idea she would does this after our D arrived.
LH19 you are correct. I confirmed I was still a plan b when I said that, BUT when I asked her to confirm she was in agreement with me and she avoided, then I removed myself as plan b.
As Acc said I did NOT contact her at all when this all occurred. I was actually trying to take a break and be free. This has been a H*ll of a week. First accused of being after her friend to bringing others around my D. Its a pain in the neck to detach and go on GAL'ing when she constantly slings this stuff at me. And if she IS as done as she says she is WHY in the world is she still doing this type stuff?
You don't have to *do* anything right now. In fact, I would suggest you don't. Just take a break and feel. Don't try to engage W. Don't apologize, don't put your ring back on. Just feel, just process, just wait.
There is no urgency here that you're not creating. Everything will resolve itself in time the way that it should. Let go of the handlebars and have faith. You'll be fine.
Acc
I will NOT give up on myself. I will be exactly as you say while enjoying my D at the beach this weekend. One question with all that has taken place, she is DONE with her interest in me right OR am I still on the roller coaster? Steve's comments make it sound like the ride is just beginning.
Who knows? Remember not to believe anything they say. But you can't focus on her. That will drive you crazy. Focus on D and GALing.
W 34 Me 42 Married 7 years together 8 0 kids 1 beloved dog BD 4/6/2018 I moved out 4/7/2018 I moved back in alone 8/05/2018 I file 3/06/2019 D official 5/7/2019
The ride is just beginning. She won't be done with you for a long time, nor will you be done with her. Since you have a daughter together you will be intermeshed for 18+ years.
In my sitch W just wanted me to let her off the hook guilt-free. She just wanted to walk away and pursue her life without having to worry about if I would be okay or not.
I remember eventually realizing that I had no feelings for her anymore. If she was nice to me, I didn't care. If she was mean to me I didn't care. She became "emotionally irrelevant". That doesn't mean that I was rude, mean, or dismissive of her, it just means that if she had sex with another man on my front lawn I'd shrug, think "that's an odd thing for her to do" and go about my business.
At that point, I was *fully detached* or had "dropped the rope" as they say. I don't think you can actively will yourself to get there, it kind of just happens on its own, and it takes lots of time, but eventually you're done. Until it does, you have to rely upon "act as if".
Ironically only after that happened did W take any interest. At one point she started crying and said that she felt like she never existed, and like I wouldn't care if she died. She had finally realized that she couldn't come back, and she didn't like it. I felt sorry that she was sad, like I would feel sorry for anyone who was sad, but it didn't impact how I felt about myself or about her at all.
Filing for D yourself won't restore your feeling of control over your life unless you truly want to be divorced.
So if you don't want to divorce and give up at this point, why did you tell her you were done? Was it frustration in the heat of the moment, or were you trying to push her to ask you not to be done? Do you remember what was driving you in the moment?
One of the things that happens in DB is that sometimes we will say something in order to provoke a specific reaction. More often than not, we don't get the reaction we wanted, and then we feel even worse. That's just something to be aware of. If you're trying to provoke W to get expressions of guilt, remorse, fear or doubt, you'll often get the opposite and feel even worse.
Feel free to keep venting here obviously, ignore advice that doesn't resonate with you, and use the advice that does. Keep doing your thing!
Acc
Married 18, Together 20, Now Divorced M: 48, W: 50, D: 18, S: 16, D: 12 Bomb Dropped (EA, D): 7/13/11 Start Reconcile: 8/15/11 Bomb Dropped (EA, D): 5/1/2014 (Divorced) In a New Relationship: 3/2015
Acc...yep you are right and as far as co-parent I think we are very good. in my sitch W wants to walk away, everybody be ok with it while doing nothing, approve of her trips all the time all while she seems to truly care about me.
Right now I want to be dropped the rope with her. Assuming we had trust on the OM topic, I felt I was working towards that. If we do not, then I need her to know I'm done and not a plan b. I don't know the truth on that, nor even if I did, do I feel like I'm far enough along to file right now. I'm doing good with GAL, but just still want a new marriage with her while she seems completely closed down and done.
Me telling her I was done was a reaction to her not being able to simply say YES I still agree we are not seeing/dating other people until we D. I wanted to let her know in the strongest way possible that is my ultimate boundary. Thing is if she did have an OM, but came through whatever she needed to go through and then came back...I can't honestly say what I would do.
Forgive me up front, to say I feel not very good at this whole thing is an understatement. I'm a moral man, loves his wife to death, wants her to have all the time she needs to sort out what she wants so long as she keeps our trust. All of the infidelity, lies, etc...I'm not good at knowing how to handle any of it so I feel like I'm flailing around.
The OM question is irrelevant. You need to move on and act like you're done. It's not an agreement that you can enforce. What are you going to do? keep checking on her? That's absurd and it takes you back a hundred steps in your own healing.
Don't lead with words, but action. Best to go with the realization that if she doesn't have OM now, she can have one next week. You cannot let her actions dictate your behavior.
Monday I was advised out of the blue to not go after her BFF as she is married, her BFF and not available! I was like "WTF", mouth dropped wide open! Today out of the blue I got an email from W saying "please keep any girls you plan to date/see away from our D!" Um, when we split we agreed that we would NOT see nor date anyone else. The whole point of the separation was to allow us to work on the relationship and I was completely sticking to that. So I replied and said are we still in agreement on NOT seeing or dating anyone else? Simple yes/no question. She deferred around it. I said I want to speak with you today, she refused. We went around a bit and then I told her I'm done. She said she was too. She could not even meet me to talk and she has done exactly nothing in 3 months.
Ballast, you're letting this go back and forth too much. Your response should simply be "I'm not dating anyone for now." Period. End of story. If she wants to continue ranting and raving then just ignore her.
You can't control whether she dates or not, you can only control yourself. So don't worry about a "deal" with her and whether she is meeting the terms or not. She's a WAS, all bets are now off.
Quote:
So now I guess she'll be divorcing me. I really was getting to grips with what was being said here, but once my ring came off it's like she lost her mind.
No, she is just realizing that you may not be hanging on as Plan B and it freaked her out. It's like my wife said about my ex-girlfriend (who was also her best friend at the time) when we started dating- "she doesn't want you, but she doesn't want anyone else to have you either." That is where your wife is. She doesn't want you, but she wants you to pine away for her and wait in the wings. When you start DB'ing it shakes up the WAS and they react in very strong ways.
