Hoosjim's 9th: WW, A ended(?); "All-in" or not?

[artista]

If we are going to move forward we cant have these things overhanging from the past. And dishonesty or burying it or ignoring it ain't gonna help.

You are highly intelligent... But what you do not seem to get is, you are not moving forward... You cannot piece by yourself...

After reading your last entry, it occurred to me that you are both MAINTAINING... she is maintaining your marriage in a limbo state, and you are maintaining any semblance of hope... And it's just semblance, but you seem satisfied with it... Neither of you is being honest and open, because that would make it all messy... It would interrupt your maintaining...

BTW, she could very easily have shopped for those bags of items with receipts and all, and still have time to meet OM... I did that all the time... For all you know, he could have gone shopping with her... I had a friend, (the one I eventually gave up after reconciliation) who went shopping with her OM, and together they shopped for his wife's Christmas gift... Imagine that)...

I have more to say about the religious aspect, but I am on my way out to take my 91-year old momma Christmas shopping... Mis dos centavos... Adelante...

--artista

[hoosjim]

Artista, that seems a fair assessment.

What suggestions would you make for breaking out of that pattern or extricating ourselves from that sitch? Particularly given that our official "procedual posture", as we lawyers like to say, is that we are engaged in MC and committed to working on the MR? If we should try to salvage the sitch and the MC, how (blunt honesty?), and, if punting is my best option how to do so without burning bridges permanently?

[LH19]

What suggestions would you make for breaking out of that pattern or extricating ourselves from that sitch?

I'll try this again.

On January 2nd I would sit your wife down and say "honey I love you and I adore you and I know I have neglected you in the past. I can not continue to live in a marriage with no intimacy. I think you are beautiful and sexy and I can't continue to live in the same house as you without being able to kiss, touch and ML to you" (you get my point)

If she says "I can't give you that" then you need to walk and don't look back. (not literally) Try to convince her to leave and if not then consider leasing an Apt for a year. You have to strongly and confidently communicate to her that these terms are not acceptable to you and are not negotiable.

DO NOT LET FEAR HOLD YOU BACK!

[hoosjim]

Thanks again, LH, and I do recall that ftom before and, TBH, that is likely my favorite approach at the moment. Only q is WON I can stomach waiting until the new year...

[LH19]

HJ,

You made it this far. The is no sense doing it before the holiday are over. I no it's not easy but as someone said on here before "Limbo is soul sucking".

[Ginger1]

Perhaps until the new year which is not too far away, why don't you just do your own thing? Table spot checking, worrying, wondering, just do what you want to do. Don't think that you have to actively have to "work on the marriage" right now. Go out, get a drink with the guys, stay home, watch a movie, hang out with your sons......

Just don't think about having to "do" anything in your M right now, Just be.

[hoosjim]

And I guess I needlessly complicated my question by listing the laundry list of all the little specific things plaguing my mind, but:

What I'm really wondering about short term is how to approach specifically this MC session this afternoon. If I am going to wait until new years to say "look, I can't keep doing this this way" and, in the interim, just focus on trying to be me and enjoy the holidays and the company of my kids (THanks, Ginger, good advice under any circumstances), then is the best/safest move for me this evening to just... shut up? Let her do the talking (if any-- might make it a shorter session because often she is reluctant to speak first) and validate, and if asked if I have any concerns just shake my head and say: "Nah."

Or, even more aggressively, just cancel the session (for which I would still be charged at this point, BTW) and say I just don't think it's timely right now?

Because I don't know how I do any talking on, well, pretty much anything that's likely to come up in session without either a) having to address one or more of those uncomfortable issues I listed or b) lying.

[Ginger1]

Then don't talk. It's ok. let her use it as an IC session:)

[hoosjim]

The woman who does not have that self centeredness and seemly has a good heart.......IMHO, reacts from her MR that has left her feeling empty and emotionally dead. She longs for romantic intimacy, tenderness, fun, etc. with her H. Going without for a long time may cause her to seek out novels or movies that feed an unmet desire in her heart. If she doesn't receive the things she desires from her H and their MR, she will often have an ongoing fantasy of how her life might be with someone else. And this can lead her into a vulnerable emotional state.

Sandi, that is a really good profile, and I know it is available elsewhere in other form in your various WW threads, but I thank you for posting a thumbnail here.

FWIW, I think the latter profile, the "previously good", fits me wife just about to a "T"... especially based on the way she has acted and even more specifically on the various things she has said. Whether that makes her and our MR salvageable is an entirely different question. She had an inordinately long period of neglect and loneliness (ironically at least somewhat due to her faith and sense of duty thereto which kept her around longer than she might have otherwise) during which to build up those wayward and rebellious feelings. I think her actual hostile resentment of me is mostly gone (at least on a conscious level), but there is no "love", at least in the romantic sense, currently. That part of our relationship was killed a long time ago. Maybe too long ago-- last time I saw her legitimately interested in me in any kind of intimate/romantic manner was four years ago, and she would say longer-- for it ever to come back.

And I understand that now. Maybe I've always understood it-- what a longshot this is at this point.




And I would add as well that it was her faith, I think... No, make that I know that I relied on, always having that in the back of my head, that kept me from having any sense of urgency on the previous two or three occasions she came to me, before OM, and said, in one way or another: "I feel unloved and undesired and sometimes I think we'd all just be better off if I left." I really, honestly, felt "safe" in the knowledge of how strong and important to her her faith was. It legitimately never occurred to me that she might actually leave-- even on the one time she actually packed her bag and I said "please don't go" even then not believing she was actually going to-- until I found out about the affair. Even before I found out, when I started having some nagging suspicions, I would always default to: she'd never cross that line.

[LH19]

I like the idea of canceling it. It communicates that you are tired of wasting your time and money on something she is half assing her way through to keep you at bay.