I decided before I went that I would dress up and try to be attractive. I wore my nicest outfit, shaved, did my eyebrows (she always laughed about my unkempt eyebrows, heh) and wore a nice aftershave. I was looking pretty boss.
I went in with a firm, but positive attitude.
We started to talk about some things we needed to work out, taxes from last year, etc. Then we started talking about the D, and of course that brought up some uncomfortable things. We both got a bit emotional. I didn't do as well as I wanted to with that, and she got upset. But...she continued to stay and talk. We got a bit more open and honest with ourselves. She brought up the things that had upset her about me...my lack of drive to take care of myself, specifically. I owned up to that. I know that during the R, I was very broken, depressed severely, and I didn't take care of myself like I should have. I told her that I recognized how that was a burden to her, and that whether or not I could have done anything else, the fact that I didn't was on me. After that, she calmed down a lot. I did, too.
She had brought a friend along as a witness. After a bit, we were walking to our cars, and the friend left. She wanted to talk a bit more about the issues, so I agreed. I owned my issues. She mentioned that there was nothing more attractive than a man who owned up to his problems.
She was looking at me and I noticed that she was slowly getting closer to me. When I thought she was getting into her car, I politely extended my hand to shake her hand. She said "I don't want your hand. I want a hug."
So I let her hug me. Not an awkward side hug. She squeezed me really tight and said that she cared about me and wanted to make sure that I'm okay through all of this, I kissed her forehead and told her that I would be fine no matter the outcome, and I hope that she is okay, too.
Aaaaaand then she kissed me. I hesitated. I said "well, this is confusing" and we had a laugh. Then she did it again, but harder.
I gave S his birthday present early. He LOVED it! W was surprised,and she seemed to be impressed that I thought about it ahead of time.
She was getting into her car, and asked me to call her. I asked her when she wanted me to call, she said "now."
I got into my car and called her. She asked if I was okay. I said "yes, ma'am" and she got flirty and said "mmmm say that again...". We got a laugh out of that.
While on the phone, we talked more about the issues. Eventually, she brought up that if she were ever to be in a relationship again, she wouldn't want it to be monogamous. I let her go on about she feels, and when she started bringing up her friends, I stopped her and gave her the "look, I'm not your gay friend" line. I told her that for me, monogamy wasn't negotiable. She of course got a bit testy about that and asserted that we probably wouldn't work, and D was the best course of action "most likely".
I told her "it's clear that we disagree on some major things, and perhaps D is the right option." I think it surprised her that I was taking that hard stance. She told me "the last ten minutes of our face to face meeting was amazing" and had all of our arguments ended that way, we'd likely still be together. She told me that I looked really good tonight, and that after we calmed down, she "missed the hell out of me" and she told me she still loves me.
I told her that I know we both still have our own issues, and I need time to keep working on mine, and in the meantime, I will respect her privacy, and I would not be pursuing a relationship with her at this time, but I also told her that the decision isn't mine to make. I would expect honesty, openness, and monogamy, and that I couldn't make that decision for her, and that I will be fine regardless of her decision.
On a somewhat related note, I start a new job tomorrow. I'm quite excited about my progress, and I've got a lot of work to do on myself. But...she has taken notice. Hopefully I'll get more opportunities to make positive impressions on her. I suppose we shall see.
BM, well done on most fronts. The only thing I would caution you on is reading too much into the positive aspects of your interaction, and forming expectations. The reason these sitches are so confusing, especially for the LBH, is that the WW, as sandi points out, wants the best of both worlds. They want the faithful H that is there helping with the house and the kids and the finances. AND they want their "sleep with who I want", GGW, partying, completely free to do what I want, wayward lifestyle too. This board is riddled with LBH in this situation.
So yeah, she sees you, she knows you've made a lot of positive changes, it is attractive, but she still has this wayward streak that she isn't quite ready to give up. That was the exact purpose of her monogamous. "I might be open to reconciliation if I still get to sleep with other people!" Cake....and eat it too. I can remember early in my sitch when my W made a comment about how we might still be able to make it work if she slept in a different bed. Essentially she was saying that she wanted her house and family, but she didn't want ME as a lover.
So you did the right thing not to jump at her talking about a future R. She probably thought you were still desperate enough that you'd be agreeable to any conditions as long as you were still with her.
The looking good was great. But what really made you attractive to her was standing up for yourself and NOT being desperate enough to just agree to anything she said. That is going to be what sticks in her head the most. Whether or not you end up back together, she will RESPECT you now. The fact she even went there with the monogamy comment showed a lack of respect. You took that respect back by saying that was non-negotiable.
One last word of caution, and it goes along with the earlier caution, don't let yourself be manipulated. I just had a couple of exchanges yesterday with LBSs that thought DBing had worked to get their WASs interested, only to see them retreat as soon as they stopped DBing and started pursuing.
DO NOT START PURSUING. I know you TOLD her you wouldn't, but continue to SHOW her you won't. Don't initiate any communication that isn't strictly about logistics around your S. Answer her questions with as few as words as necessary. Be the one to end communications. Most importantly, when she texts you messages that are informational, DO NOT RESPOND. If she later questions why you "ignored" her, just tell her the text didn't require a response.
You are LRT. Your sitch meets the specific circumstances where LRT should be employed. Be consistent.
M(53), W(54),D(19) M-23, T-25 Bomb Drop - Dec.23, 2017 Ring and Piecing since March 2018
I definitely plan to stay consistent. I'll be honest...I would LOVE to call her up and make all of the mistakes...I see why that's such an appealing path, because it feels like the right choice. But I know better. I'm definitely going to keep doing what I'm doing and let her come to me if she chooses to. I'm sticking to my guns on this, because I know that's the only way it's going to work.
Going to keep LRT going. I'm trying not to get too caught up in the positives (although I see why that's appealing), because I know you're right. But at least it appears that I'm on the right path with LRT. I'm just going to keep moving forward, stand my ground, and see what happens. Thank you, Steve.
It's strange to me. In the past few days, W has contacted me about S more than usual. And during those conversations, she's started opening up and talking more about her feelings, what she had issues with, etc. One of the things I've been trying to understand is how my actions affect her. Specifically, whenever we would argue (or even just talk about things), my ADHD symptoms would often ramp up. I would interrupt her without noticing that I was doing so, or when I would try to actively listen, I couldn't do it despite my best efforts. All of these things were completely unintentional, and quite out of control. We both accept that I never did these things to be rude, or because I didn't care, but they still happened, and even unintentional things can hurt others. She felt as though I did not take the things she said seriously, and that I just simply didn't care about her perspectives, thoughts, feelings, and the like. I would get frustrated by the criticism, and I would try to evaluate these things out loud to figure them out. To me, it was just talking about stuff. To her, I was coming off as defensive, uncaring, and just making excuses and looking for scapegoats.
Today, I'm trying to think of ways to get this under control. I realize that it will be VERY hard to control something that I often don't even realize I'm doing. I looked into individual counseling today, but right now the cost is too high. In a few weeks, once I start getting paychecks again, I might be able to make that happen. So that's my plan.
I used to scratch my head and cry and wonder how the hell I was hurting her, because I knew that I wasn't trying to be a jerk. But now I'm connecting the dots and I've learned that even if it's something small, like interrupting (not rudely, just interjecting thoughts randomly), that can have a serious impact on others if they are already tired, stressed, or frustrated.
I can see some ot the things that I need to address. I know I can only do so much on my own to address these things, and I'm likely going to need a counselor to fix them.
I can say is that I'm still working on my LRT. When we talk, I'm also trying very hard to actually listen and control the ADHD symptoms as much as I possibly can. I'm back on medication, and if nothing else, this helps me notice when I'm doing it. It's not flawless by far...I still do these things a lot. But I'm working harder to control them to the best of my ability.
While I am following the rule "don't believe anything she says", I know for certain that these things cause major problems for most people with ADHD in their relationships. As a side note, W told me today that she's about to see a dr as well, because she's been researching it herself for S, and she believes that she may also have it. So at least she's starting to understand that it can be really hard to deal with things normally with ADHD. She has definitely been softening a bit towards me. I'm showing progress in working on myself, I'm doing better with S than I did in the past, and she can tell that I'm trying to listen to what she says, although she maintains that I should have done that two years ago. And she's right about that. I will give her that. I couldn't get myself to actually do anything about it then. But now, I'm actually doing work to make these things better, more manageable, and trying to just be a better person.
During our talks, she sometimes gets angry. And I sometimes argue. But I'm also starting to notice how my behavior/words/reactions affect the conversations, and I'm trying to adjust those things so that she feels more comfortable telling me the things I need to know. It's a slow process.
Sometimes it's difficult. Most of the time, I want to just break the LRT rules and talk to her about coming back. But I don't. I know that wouldn't help at all. So I don't. However...W has said herself that it wouldn't work if we got back together right now, and she believes that D is the right option. What she HASN'T said lately is that she's dead set on it. She has said that she's noticed my changes, and that she wishes I would have made them a long time ago.
>>>But she has noticed.
I'm sticking to LRT. I don't contact her. She contacts me. If she wants to talk, I listen to the best of my ability. Will it work? I have no idea. I have my doubts. BUT...sticking to LRT seems to be far more effective than anything I tried early on. So we shall see.
Today after W got off of work, she went to her dad's house to pick up S. She called me on the way back to talk. Apparently, she was very tired from work and wanted to talk to me to keep her awake, and she also wanted to tell me how her day went.
She did bring up mediation and reminded me that she'd like to figure out as much as we can before we go, but there's still not a date set, and she's thinking the end of next month might be good.
I told her I wasn't ready to discuss all of the details of splitting things, and would prefer to wait until mediation, or at least until I've had time to think it all over.
There are some very mixed signals coming from her.
She keeps talking about the mediation, so it seems she's still wanting to take that route. BUT she's also just calling to talk to me, and she even said that she wants to take S out for his bday coming up, and she wants me to come as well so we can have some family time.
I get it...I can't read into it...these are definitely two very different signals...either she wants to D or she doesn't...but she seems to be also trying to keep me as a friend and even get closer. I don't know. I don't really think she knows what she wants. But I'm still sticking to LRT.
It's really frustrating to say the least. I can definitely say that I'm really glad to hear from her. I enjoy talking to her. But I don't really know what she's doing or thinking.
This is the key phrase in your last post. How can you possibly know what someone wants if they don't even know themselves! And due to your DBing, 180s, GAL, etc....... she is now up in the air.
The "I wish you had done this 2 years ago", or "I wish you had made changes a long time ago" is a very common refrain from WASs. 1) They are still trying to excuse their actions. "It is too late!". We've all heard that. 2) She is unsure if they are real or they are just you trying to get her back. This is a huge one. And this is why remaining consistent is so important. One begging session will undo this and you will start over from square one to try and convince her the changes are lasting. 3) They've main their "proclamation" (I want a D!), and that is not something they can or will go back on lightly. If they embrace your changes, that would be a major step towards R. And the fact that they are having second thoughts on the proclamation scares them. It took them a lot of time, consideration, and courage to make the proclamation to begin with. That is what the "let's discuss mediation" thing is all about. It is her trying to convince you, and herself!, that that is still what she wants.
Keep on keeping on. As I told another poster last week, the temptation for the LBS, once they start seeing positive effects from DBing, is to stop DBing and go back to pursuing and pressuring. That will send her running faster than anything. So fight that urge! Time and consistency. Trust me, you will no undoubtably if and when she changes her mind!
M(53), W(54),D(19) M-23, T-25 Bomb Drop - Dec.23, 2017 Ring and Piecing since March 2018
