To be quite honest I pretty much had let her go on her own journey other than telling her that I would not be a part of it which caused the position we are in now of her "being open to counseling".
If you still know when she is contacting OM, then she isnt on her own journey.
Originally Posted By: Laowai
the BEST choice for me is to tell her that I am done and wish for her to no longer contact me. I understand everyone here says show her with actions, but I disagree with this. I will not intentionally ignore someone without TELLING them why I am doing so...not because I owe her an explanation, but because my conscience won't allow me to do this.
If you want to send her a no contact letter, then fine, go ahead and do it. But, to me, that seems unnecessary. YOU are making a choice to go to counseling and such. All you can control is what is in your sphere. To me, explaining the reasons behind no contact is only being done so that you can get her to try to pursue you.
She is engaging in an EA/PA, admits it to your face, feels justified and unapologetic, has stated she hates you.
What more do you need to see before you let her go on her journey and you begin on yours?
To me this would mean to more IC. No R talk explaining why no more IC. No more communication beyond one word responses necessary for a bit here (until you can do it without explaining, arguing, defending, attacking, trying to get her to see your point of view, temp checking, and on and on and on and on and on and on. Just stop.).
She's shown you how she is going to treat you. If you don't protect yourself you are responsible for any further harm she causes you.
PS- I like your comment about the affair. To be fair to Sotto, I would say there are many reasons why a spouse might be tempted to have an affair. But in the end they only actually happen for one reason.
To be quite honest I pretty much had let her go on her own journey other than telling her that I would not be a part of it which caused the position we are in now of her "being open to counseling". I had already protected myself, I had moved forward, I had gotten used to the idea of being without her, I HAD/HAVE accepted it. Then I stated all of this to her to let her and it caused us to move down this path. Unfortunately m this path isn't a good one either as she is still texting the OM (albeit no where near as much), and she has no remorse. With this said, all of the work that I have done with MY IC has led me to believe that the BEST choice for me is to tell her that I am done and wish for her to no longer contact me. I understand everyone here says show her with actions, but I disagree with this. I will not intentionally ignore someone without TELLING them why I am doing so...not because I owe her an explanation, but because my conscience won't allow me to do this.
My counselor suggested that based on how i felt at the end of the couples counseling today that I should make a decision and stick to it. I certainly agree with her. All this time I have truly waited to have a "feeling" that I was done, but I feel like that may not be realistic. It is probably more realistic to make the conscious decision to be done and things will fall into place after that.
This all makes sense.
I agree you can't wait around for a feeling. Actions lead, feelings follow.
When are you making your statement? In counseling? With a hand written letter?
I think following through on this and then remaining no contact for 90 days will be what this takes. After that it will still be difficult, but it does get much more manageable.
Me:38 XW:38 T:11 years M:8 years Kids: S14, D11, D7 BD/Move out day: 6/17/14, D final Dec 15
To be quite honest I pretty much had let her go on her own journey other than telling her that I would not be a part of it which caused the position we are in now of her "being open to counseling".
If you still know when she is contacting OM, then she isnt on her own journey.
Originally Posted By: Laowai
the BEST choice for me is to tell her that I am done and wish for her to no longer contact me. I understand everyone here says show her with actions, but I disagree with this. I will not intentionally ignore someone without TELLING them why I am doing so...not because I owe her an explanation, but because my conscience won't allow me to do this.
If you want to send her a no contact letter, then fine, go ahead and do it. But, to me, that seems unnecessary. YOU are making a choice to go to counseling and such. All you can control is what is in your sphere. To me, explaining the reasons behind no contact is only being done so that you can get her to try to pursue you.
To be fair, I do still have the ability to determine when she is contacting OM. I hadn't done it for months unitl she asked me to go to counseling and told me that she had discontinued communication with him. Seeing as trust is a big issue (and most counselors DEMAND the LBS be able to access all forms of communication) I chose to do a little digging at random times to see if she was still contacting him. This was more for myself to know if there was even an ounce of "trustworthiness" there right now.
As I stated, I understand the premise of letting your actions speak. I also understand how strongly YOU feel on this based off of reading almost all of your posts lol.
She is engaging in an EA/PA, admits it to your face, feels justified and unapologetic, has stated she hates you.
What more do you need to see before you let her go on her journey and you begin on yours?
To me this would mean to more IC. No R talk explaining why no more IC. No more communication beyond one word responses necessary for a bit here (until you can do it without explaining, arguing, defending, attacking, trying to get her to see your point of view, temp checking, and on and on and on and on and on and on. Just stop.).
She's shown you how she is going to treat you. If you don't protect yourself you are responsible for any further harm she causes you.
PS- I like your comment about the affair. To be fair to Sotto, I would say there are many reasons why a spouse might be tempted to have an affair. But in the end they only actually happen for one reason.
To be quite honest I pretty much had let her go on her own journey other than telling her that I would not be a part of it which caused the position we are in now of her "being open to counseling". I had already protected myself, I had moved forward, I had gotten used to the idea of being without her, I HAD/HAVE accepted it. Then I stated all of this to her to let her and it caused us to move down this path. Unfortunately m this path isn't a good one either as she is still texting the OM (albeit no where near as much), and she has no remorse. With this said, all of the work that I have done with MY IC has led me to believe that the BEST choice for me is to tell her that I am done and wish for her to no longer contact me. I understand everyone here says show her with actions, but I disagree with this. I will not intentionally ignore someone without TELLING them why I am doing so...not because I owe her an explanation, but because my conscience won't allow me to do this.
My counselor suggested that based on how i felt at the end of the couples counseling today that I should make a decision and stick to it. I certainly agree with her. All this time I have truly waited to have a "feeling" that I was done, but I feel like that may not be realistic. It is probably more realistic to make the conscious decision to be done and things will fall into place after that.
This all makes sense.
I agree you can't wait around for a feeling. Actions lead, feelings follow.
When are you making your statement? In counseling? With a hand written letter?
I think following through on this and then remaining no contact for 90 days will be what this takes. After that it will still be difficult, but it does get much more manageable.
If I do choose to make this statement (which right now I am really leaning towards doing so) it will be face to face. I absolutely despise text messaging, email, letters for emotional or personal based communication. Therefore, to stay true to myself it will be in person.
Hi Laowai, I'm sorry to read about your W's comments at your recent counselling session. I understand that you wouldn't want to continue investing your time and effort in those circumstances - ie: she is unrepentant and continues to be in touch with OM.
The only thing I would say is - it doesn't need to be as black and white as I am done/not done. I think shades of grey (sorry!) in between those is worth considering. The minimum you want to do is stop with the counselling - so just doing that is an option. It sounds as though you also don't want to be in touch if she's in touch wit OM - again fair enough.
But both of these things may not mean that you are done - just that this is how things will be for now (and unless things undergo significant change on her part in which case you can see where you are at.) When we feel so upset about things, we sometimes want to jump to the biggest reaction/decision - but I think it could be an option to protect yourself (emotionally) with clear boundaries - and live your own life allowing some more time to pass....then see where you are at further down the road.
I don't think our emotional progress can really be measured in weeks, more like months or years...
T 13 M 7 Me 48 H 46 SS 15 BD 7.14 PA D final 5.16 (H filed)
We receive & we lose, and must try to achieve gratitude & embrace with whole hearts whatever of life that remains after the losses - Dubus
Well, Monday we had another session and I again went in very open minded trying to be as undertanding as possible. However, I knew that she had been in contact with OM so I was really interested to see if she would volunteer this information. She didn't, but did admit to it after being asked. However, she shrugs it off as no big deal because "it's not the same as it was". They are "just friends now and the conversations are minimal". She can't grasp that this is still not acceptable for myself or the counselor. She thinks we are being totally unreasonable and controlling. I then told her in counseling that she is clearly free to choose to talk to him or do whatever else it is that she wants, but I will not be a part of it. So the counselor then asked "WW are you willing to go NO CONTACT with OM?" To which she said "no". My response was "well, I am done here then and there is no need for us to continue counseling together...I do hope that you (WW) will continue counseling to find your path in life."...And I thanked the counselor and walked outside. WW came outside seconds later and said she's done with counseling and done being told that she is immoral. She's tired of living up to society's expectations of what is moral and immoral. I just simply said to her that I am sure having these conflicting views must be difficult, and I wish it had never come to this. We parted ways and I honestly fel....I felt so bad for her. I felt like she will never be a whole person because she will never put in the work necessary. It was such a deflating moment actually.
The A talk is interesting to hear from men who have been the LBSer.
(I'm not getting all political here, I swear!)
Just saying that while affairs are always hurtful and I think always wrong, the causes are not all the same, and the ability to heal from them is not always the same.
Women TEND to have A's that are more emotionally important than purely physical As are, for men. So in some ways, these affairs are more likely to be justified in the women's minds and hearts. (One night stands are not what I'm referring to, btw).
Without addressing the emotional piece of the A's, there's not going to be a lasting reconciliation.
Just to be clear, the emotional piece may be all due to deficits in the wife, OR largely due to unmet needs in the m that the LBH really played a role in.
It takes a lot of bravery to own our parts in these painful ordeals.
Considering all the pain of these debacles, we should at least get our money's worth of growth.
M: 57 H: 60 M: 35 yrs S30,D28,D19 H off to Alaska 2006 Recon 7/07- 8/08 *2016* X = "ALASKA 2.0" GROUND HOG DAY I File D 10/16 OW DIV 2/26/2018 X marries OW 5/2016
Well, interestingly enough I've had a couple conversations with my WW across the past couple days. She truly feels like me telling her that ZERO CONTACT with her AP would be necessary for me is completely unreasonable. She has went as far as to counter and say that SHE would NEED me to have ZERO CONTACT with my best friend. I will admit that my best friend was the cause of a significant amount of grief in our relationship and I didn't really see it at that time. But through counseling I have drastically changed my relationship with him to be much more healthy, as well as healthy to not interfere with the next romantic relationship I have. Regardless of all of this, it feels more like a "you ask me for something I feel is unreasonable, I'll do the same from you" from her. I don't feel like I should give up my friendship with him just because of her "tit for tat" attitude. I am so baffled all of this. She keeps telling me that she has completely changed her relationship with OM...and that its not good enough for me. I'm not really sure how to respond to this.
So wait a minute, she thinks it is unfair for you to say that she should have no contact with the OM? Am I correct in reading this? And that you can't have contact with your best friend? Even if you friend was the cause of grief, you weren't sleeping with him. Good grief. Maybe you should bring that up...
Quote:
She keeps telling me that she has completely changed her relationship with OM...and that its not good enough for me. I'm not really sure how to respond to this.
Simple. The OM needs to be out of the picture, completely. There is no "just being friends" with him. Excuse me, but what an idiot. Wow. Just wow.
There are moments in this life when you are so confident in the rightness of your actions, that not even for a second do you consider the option that you might be wrong.
If it's any consolation, it sounds like you handled yourself very well.