When I think back on when W and I first fell in love, she was perfect. And in her eyes, so was I. That was 25 years ago. About two years ago, my world was turned upside down.
What happened? Did she change? Did I?
Yes. We both changed. And if we both changed so fundamentally, then isn’t it logical that the only thing to do is to go our separate ways? Even if physical separation wasn’t practical because of the kids, we’d grown apart, and that would never change would it?
But I still loved her. I still wanted to be with her. Why?
Because fundamentally, neither of us had changed. The core person that I fell in love with was still there, and vice versa.
She no longer saw me through rose coloured glasses. She’d “matured” to the point that she realized that putting me on a pedistal was wrong, and also that it was wrong for me to do the same to her. It’s not “real.”
The “reality” was that I was an insensitive, selfish, domineering lout.
Had I been completely insensitive throughout my M, and only came to realize it when my W “changed?” Or even worse, was I domineering and insensitive to the point that she was never able to be herself. She didn’t change, she only decided not to let me “do ‘it’” to her anymore.
That was her reality.
But, there’s no such thing as reality. There’s no such thing as right or wrong.
There’s perception, and there’s what works (or doesn’t).
I don’t know how long it took for my M to get into trouble. It seemed to happen overnight. I was still wearing my rose coloured glasses.
But whatever I was doing only served to reinforce her newfound reality.
So I set out to reverse the damage in a painful process of discovering what her perception of me really was, and what I did to evoke such a negative perception.
Each revelation cut me like a knife. I remember telling her, “But I’m not like that!” Her reply was, “Yes you are.”
There were times when she even went as far to say, “You are, and always have been.”
There’s no rebuttal for that.
The only path left open to me was to stop doing anything to reinforce that perception.
That meant allowing her to think whatever she thought of me. Allowing her to do whatever she felt she needed to be “real.”
It meant that I no longer had any valid feelings.
Of course, this is an oversimplification. Both in terms of her perception and mine. But I did have to spend a lot of time swallowing my pride, duct-taping my mouth and sucking in a lot of hurt.
And it worked.
I was no longer an insensitive, selfish, domineering lout. In fact, I never was! Now, I was someone who had “a lot of patience” with her!
So things are great, right?
Well, they’re much better, but there’s still something missing.
Yes, her perception of me has changed. But her perception of the validity of my needs/wants/desires has not.
My W is an important part of my R. But now, I have to ask myself, “What about me?”
It would seem simple for me to simply ask for what I want, but here’s the kicker…
When I do so, the response is still opposition. What I want is either impractical (can’t spend more time alone because of S#2/autism), she’s too tired (and this is true), or unnecessary (OR has evolved. We don’t [I]need[/I] to do these things.)
On the last item, it always seems to go back to, “You’ve always put too much importance on… «my desire».”
So DB has changed me from villain to good guy.
My problem now, is…
How do I get my W to accept my needs, desires, wants, opinions without reverting to the bad ole Andy. The Andy that never was.
I can’t do a 180. 180+180 = 360, and we’d be right back to where we started.
Quoting ANS: When I think back on when W and I first fell in love. . . I get my W to accept my needs, desires, wants, opinions without reverting to the bad ole Andy. The Andy that never was.
I can’t do a 180. 180+180 = 360, and we’d be right back to where we started.
Oh, Andy. Don't look at it like a math problem.
Look at it as a journey. Every step is the journey . There is a circle and at the beginning of the journey round that circle is that perfect love shared between your wife and you. Twenty-five years of travel round that circle. You're peering ahead to find the happy ending of your marriage journey. Remember that as you travel so does the circle. It has no beginning and it has no end. Somewhere in time you are going to get a glimpse of what you are seeking. Continue being patient and making the steps that cause that circle to spin round. One day you and your wife will be back at that place where the journey began. Twenty-five plus years will change your perceptions so it won't look quite the same when you reach that point. Your doing what you've been doing will get you there. You'll be able to look back at the beginning and look forward to the future, and not the sum of 180 + 180.
Quote: Well, they’re much better, but there’s still something missing.
Yes, her perception of me has changed. But her perception of the validity of my needs/wants/desires has not.
My W is an important part of my R. But now, I have to ask myself, “What about me?”
It would seem simple for me to simply ask for what I want, but here’s the kicker…
When I do so, the response is still opposition.
Andy,
There is one more perception that needs to be addressed between her preception of "me" and "her perception of the validity of my needs/wants/desires" ... and that is her perception of her feeling towards you! Michelle's writes about this in DR about how the feeling really don't change, but how they interpret (preceive) those feelings does...
I love you, but i'm not in love with you.
Once they accept that you are the "new" you, then they have to reprocess through their feelings towards you. To take your mathmatical metaphor ... You have changed a variable in the equation and now she has to recalculate the formula to see the new result. I do feel what that outside influences (son's autism, etc...) appear to drain the batteries of her calculater (sort to speak) which in turn slows down the reprocessing. I don't know if there is a way in which you can recharge her batteries or perhaps upgrade her calculater to a "Pentium 4"? but there's a good chance she might have to do this by herself and you will need to be patient a little while longer. Until she does change her preception at this step, I'm afraid you cannot work on her preception of what you need. You can't pass GO, you can't collect the $200 ....
It does seem like once they do come up with the new answer to the equation and decide how they will act upon it, then they change very quickly ... like turning on a light switch and THEN you can "ask for what you want".
I’m not trying to reduce my R to mathematics, Lily. I was just using it to illustrate my current dilemma.
All I’m trying to say is that I’ve been doing “something different” for quite awhile now. I’ve made more headway than a lot of people. But there’s still something missing. The 180+180 analogy was only supposed to illustrate that I can’t do any more 180’s. I stopped pushing W – at least as well as I could. But it didn’t take me all the way.
I can’t start pushing, can I? In that sense 180+180=360.
Maybe all this means that I’ve arrived. Maybe I’ve done all I could, and this is as good as it gets. Dunno.
KAW,
My W never gave me the “I’m not in love with you” line. I don’t think she ever believed that. Even if she did, I don’t think that’s her mindset right now.
I said in my initial post that my summary was an oversimplification. You have to bear in mind that it would take waaaaaaaaaay too much storage on this BB to really put all of the nuances to print.
I’d love for her to have a lightbulb moment as you described. I’ve seen it happen on these boards too. But it ain’t gonna happen for me.
Fact is, our life is stressful. Everyone’s life is, but as I’ve said before, we just don’t get any respite. So we have to take it where we can find it. For W, that means getting as far away from it as much as she can.
Something I’ve posted before is that anyone who isn’t a complete a**hole is willing to give to others. The problem is that we do not tend to give other people (and especially our spouse) what they want but we will bend over backwards to give them what we want.
My W would be perfectly willing to give me all the space and time I could wish for in order to help me relax in the midst of all of our home stress. I could go out with whomever I wanted, and as often as I wanted. My W is not a selfish b*tch!
My W believes that the only way we can get respite is to take turns. That doesn’t fit with the kind of respite I want.
Dunno if this makes sense to you, but I’m gonna stop rambling now.
"I stopped pushing W - at least as well as I could. But it didn't take me all the way.
I can't start pushing, can I?"
Nope, I don't think that "pushing" is ever really the answer. It can only take you so far.
In what ways can a person start "pulling" their relationship along? In what ways can a partner "draw" their spouse into "wanting" to fulfill their wants/needs/desires?
JJ
Read about Divorce Busting® Telephone Coaching here!
Quoting Jamesjohn:"I stopped pushing W - at least as well as I could. But it didn't take me all the way.
I can't start pushing, can I?"
Nope, I don't think that "pushing" is ever really the answer. It can only take you so far.
In what ways can a person start "pulling" their relationship along? In what ways can a partner "draw" their spouse into "wanting" to fulfill their wants/needs/desires?
That's the million dollar question, JJ.
What really drove me to starting a new thread is that all of the negativity that characterized my M two years ago seems to be gone.
Go dark, act as-if, do a 180. All great techniques to turn things around.
But things have turned around. Problem is, the switch KAW referred to didn't get flipped on.
There's more. I know there is.
I saw Kent post somewhere that "piecing" is untested territory (or something like that). We have to be more innovative.
Maybe there's nothing else I can do. If that's the case, then I guess this thread will fizzle into oblivion.
But you've hit the nail on the head, JJ. How can I draw her into wanting to fulfil my needs?
Good question Andy, very good question. I'd like to know the answer to that one myself. I know I have changed but Adrian;s perseption of that change has not caught up to reality yet.Oh, he sees little things, but not the big things. He's still saying I'm doing things I know I'm not doin gnaymore or if I do its rare. It only takes one time though for him to be back to square one. Very frustrating. I have to be patient like you and keep it up for a long time fro him to really take notice. I want the lightbulb to come on too.Maybe I've got it screwed in too tight or not tight enough. Time is all that will tell. Rachael
Quote: I can’t start pushing, can I? In that sense 180+180=360.
The analogy of a 180 is not to be taken literally as the solution. Yes, initially we have to make an extreme change to break their long standing preception of our patterns of behavior. But once we have convinced them the orginal patterns are destroyed, we cannot fall into the danger of creating new pattern with extreme 180's. Once the patterns are broken, then:
it is OK to push ... just don't start a pattern of pushing ... it is OK to need ... just don't start a pattern of needing ... it is OK to want ... just start don't a pattern of wanting ...
It is human to be all these things at some time, we only get in trouble when we get stuck in a rut of repeating it over and over. Doing just a 180 does not achieve the desired outcome, it is just a catalyst to start the process in the right direction. We need to moderate our behavior in order to prevent being stuck in our 180 or reverting back to the way we were as 360.
Again, I didn't mean for you to take the " love, but not in love " statement literally, but rather what it represents. Every S that turns away from R had to change their preceptions of how they feel towards their partner in order to detach themselves from the R. In order for them to turn back to R, these preceptions need to be changed again. While your W may never gave you the “I’m not in love with you” line, she had to change something about how she feels in order to once be OK with living "parallel" lives. As you said something is missing and IMHO, how she preceives her feelings towards you should not be overlooked.
Andy, I just had a light bulb go on in re: parallel lives...
Quote: My W believes that the only way we can get respite is to take turns. That doesn’t fit with the kind of respite I want.
If you were able to change her perception about above, it would go a long way to bringing you closer together!!!
"It does seem like once they do come up with the new answer to the equation and decide how they will act upon it, then they change very quickly ... like turning on a light switch and THEN you can "ask for what you want"."
I think that a big part of this is realizing that the switch ain't your typical "on/off" toggle switch. It's more of a "dimmer" switch, that's going to vary in it's brightness and dimness.
"I saw Kent post somewhere that "piecing" is untested territory (or something like that). We have to be more innovative."
Man, ain't that the truth!
I kinda see all the DB'ing stuff we've done up to this point as "practice". Most of the times, at this point we are using the same basic "techniques", we just have to fine-tune them, know when to "hit-and-run" with them, know when to be more consistent with them, learn how to blend the techniques more, etc., etc.
The recipes we are using are a bit more involved, but we we are cooking up tastes a bit better as we go along. In this part of the process, we aren't always going exactly like the cookbook says, but we're using a lot of the same ingredients, and adjusting the amounts to our tastes!
JJ
Read about Divorce Busting® Telephone Coaching here!
but there's a good chance she might have to do this by herself and you will need to be patient a little while longer. Until she does change her preception at this step, I'm afraid you cannot work on her preception of what you need. You can't pass GO, you can't collect the $200 .... 
