I am entering a new stage and I think it is Detaching. I think she is intreged by this.
Fish, I would love to hang at the Cigar shop but there are three big problems. I don't smoke, drink or play cards. I may be the worlds most boring guy but what i love most is hangin with my boys.
I am going to Colorado Thursday and am going to GAL my but off. I am sure my W will have a good time while I am gone but hey I can not control that and really could not give a S***.
FYI: My W stopped in for 10 minutes after she was bacck from Philly and ran right out the door to a friends house. She is totally neglecting us now but it is nice when she is not here.
I kinda feel bad for the boys but it is really nice when she is not here. Am I detaching for I really don't miss her?
BT - Stopped in for 10 minutes after being away all weekend???
It's time to go on offense and kick her ass to the curb.
Just hanging with your boys does not qualify for GAL. Dude you must stop living in your old life and start a new one. Time to look at things differently.
Start doing things you normally would not do... start playing poker, start drinking a little wine, start smoking cigars...
I strongly believe that my W loves me very much and all her pain comes from this decision she has made to leave our marriage. Tree, I believe that. I feel similarly about my decision. She us hurting but cannot bear to reverse herself. She is cutting her nose off to spite her face, and she is cursing me the entire time. (It's all my fault, you see)
I like the exhortations from fish to Tree: get a new life.Definitely a transition point - an opportunity to open up to new things. Could be fun.
By the way, call a lawyer before changing residence arrangements. If you are considering "kicking her to the curb", call a lawyer. If you are planning to leave yourself, call a lawyer first. Especially important if you have kids.
Zebra - about your comments on the other thread - That's what I meant when I said the SSW was always recruiting... I believe it's because they want to substantiate their feelings that they did the right thing by ending their marriage. It seems the less they did to safe their own situation, the harder they work to get others to join the club and "just move on". Oh, yea! I know exactly what you mean. My W is now only friends with divorced or divorcing people. When she started building this new batch of friends, I remember her getting really peeved at me when I suggested that we get together with some married couples. They have some sort of subconscious affinity for each other.
M 43 S14 S13 D11 D7 Divorce final: Jan 2009 Making it up as I go....
Does anyone know how to get my old threads back in MLC and Separated?
You cannot "get them back". The board locks them after 100 messages or so to keep things orderly. I don't think it's very efficient, but they didn't ask me.
If you want to see it, just go back to it and look. It's pretty much visible forever. If you want to link it to your current thread, you just need to post the URL, like this: http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=1365969 (I got this by just copying and pasting from the old thread).
If you want to look fancy, and post a link, click on the first icon in the message box tool bar, paste in the link, then type or past in the title when asked, like this:
Also, in my opinion, it's counterproductive and not really a good idea to keep 2 threads going that are essentially the same discussion. You will get fragmented answers, and it's very hard to follow. I suggest you direct viewers of your Separated thread to this one. I think this one is more relevent.
I strongly believe that my W loves me very much and all her pain comes from this decision she has made to leave our marriage. Tree, I believe that. I feel similarly about my decision. She us hurting but cannot bear to reverse herself. She is cutting her nose off to spite her face, and she is cursing me the entire time. (It's all my fault, you see)
I agree with this as well. My question now is how in the world can they ever see there's a way back? That reversing is not giving up on something she needs to do for herself and she's not letting herself or anyone else down by doing so? Do they think they've come too far now to just drop everything, and by doing so it would make them feel weak and beaten and like a failure? Do they actually feel TRAPPED in the decision to leave now?
Me:37 WAW:35 M:10 T:15 Ds:9, 5 She Dropped Bomb:9/02/07 Both still at home
I strongly believe that my W loves me very much and all her pain comes from this decision she has made to leave our marriage.
There is a lot of truth to this observation, but I believe it's only half the truth. Instead of "all", you might reconsider this statement with "much" instead. See, you have described how she feels now about the current situation. The one where she is pulling away and sees the pain it is causing you and others, and is suffering with all of her own guilt in causing that pain and confusion for others.
What this statement misses is why she felt that she had to pull away in the first place. That pain, the pain that was so overwhelming to her that she had to pull away is the pain we must address, the pain that must be addressed. It was mentioned that she cannot bear to reverse herself. You have hit the nail on the head with that observation. Nor, I believe, should she.
The marriage was not working for her, so she pulled away. She will not return to that marriage. In that light, you must understand that the marriage that it was before is dead and cannot be resumed. The only way to get her to come back is to transform the the marriage back into something like it was in the beginning, when there was lots of love and romance. When you and she lived and loved together. When you shared and had shared goals. Before either of you got too busy.
This is the crux of DB. It is the epitome of what I believe is the heart of what Michele is saying. I believe the heart of her message is (paraphrased) "You must always consider your goals. If what you are doing or considering doing will bring you closer to reaching those goals, do more of it. If what your are doing is pushing you farther from your goals, better think and do something else". You must transform the marriage for it to survive, because as it is now, or has been recently, it is not working, it is not bringing anyone closer to their goals. And the only way you can do that right now it to transform yourself by becoming the best you can be. We must all stop wallowing in wondering how to bring her back, how much about what WE want, and accept that things have changed and that we need to keep the change going in a positive manner.
There is still strong attachment at this point of marital breakdown. Strong enough that if the situation truly changes to eliminate the initial pain that caused her to pull away, she will come back. But be assured, she won't come back to the way it was.
The biggest thing I learned through my painful experience was how much of the entire situation was my fault. It truly takes 2. Sure, she was wrong, cuz she pulled away, she had the affair, she was trying to end it all. But most importantly, she was trying to survive in the best way she saw at the time. Even more importantly, I was wrong for allow my part in the marriage to allow it to become a stale drudgery and more like a sentence than a loving life partnership. She was running from our marriage, from the life's failures to live up to her expectations and from the perception that she didn't want her future life and marriage to be an infinite continuation of the what she was trying to leave behind.
We are all part of the problem that has caused our marriages to falter. We share in the failures of expectations. We need to change ourselves and our lives and our marriages back to a level of hopefulness with a bright future. And right now, we can only do this by and for ourselves. If we are successful, WAW will likely notice and hopefully decide to rejoin us and come along for the rest of the ride. If she doesn't, then we have the benefit of having transformed ourselves into people WE really like, and whom others will like, and who can move ahead in satisfying, happy lives no matter what direction that may take us.
My thoughts for a Monday Morning. Have a great week!
The tough thing is to show her a great person and marriage that answers all the initial reasons for her leaving when they are so resistant to see it, they probably don't even want it or care. I can do it "for me", and that makes it a true change, but of course we're going to hopeful that this leads to reconciliation. So many of the changes we're making are centered around the family and not just ourselves.
There's a big step between them having had enough and wanting to move on, and wanting to try again with the same person who is now changed and answers all the initial problems. That's the breakthrough everyone is searching for here. How do we define that crucial step in all of this? It seems to be the key.
I would hope that the links between people (kids, family, friends, home, ...) might be enough to make trying again the best option, but I think the fear of going back, giving up on a decision to quit that was so hard to make, and how they might look to everyone now could be a big obstacle when they start to have doubts about leaving.
Me:37 WAW:35 M:10 T:15 Ds:9, 5 She Dropped Bomb:9/02/07 Both still at home
