Previous Thread
Next Thread
Print Thread
Page 1 of 4 1 2 3 4
#2871874 11/12/19 12:10 PM
Joined: Nov 2019
Posts: 15
S
Slarty Offline OP
New Member
OP Offline
New Member
S
Joined: Nov 2019
Posts: 15
So my wife of 4 years told me a few weeks ago that she was unhappy in our marriage and needed space to be away from me and our daughter and my stepson. My daughter is 2 and my stepson is 9. She said she was going to go out with friends on the weekends. She said that we were done and we could go do and see whoever we wanted. She doesnt love me anymore and wants to move out in a few months once she saves up the money.

After 2 weeks of going out with her friends I find that she is having a physical affair with a guy she met out. I didnt blow up or expose what i know about the 2 of them. I had my blow up the 2 weeks before that when she told me she was done with us. I want to work on our relationship and i know it is a long hard road. She wont go to MC so i am seeing a counselor on my own.

She gets 2 nights a week to stay out overnight and i get 2 nights a week. I have been taking advantage of it going out with friends and sleeping over at my brothers. She only knows that I am not coming home at night and has started saying things about how she can never "touch" me again now that I have been with another women. As a side note I got a cold sore a week ago. I havent had one in years. I was going to kiss my daughter goodnight and I then remembered I had the coldsore so i told her i couldnt kiss her tonight. So my wife chimed in saying yeah, Daddy has cold sores from kissing other women. I found out after reading my wifes texts the nect day that her affair partner had a cold sore and gave one to her which I then got. I told her that if she was to stay here in this home the talking about being with other people in front of our children needs to stop.

She had a terrible upbringing bouncing from foster home to foster home as her parents wanted nothing to do with her. She is close with her sister but other than that she has no family and only a couple work friends as she is quite introverted.

I owned the marital home before I met her and their is not much she can take from a divorce after i spoke with a lawyer about my sitch.

She is trying to guilt me into helping to take care of her stepson after she moves out. I told her I love him but he is not going to be my responsibility once we are D.

We hadnt slept in the marital bed together for the last year as things between us has not been good for a while. She had slept in there with our daughter every night. I told her I am splitting time in the master bedroom now. She started yelling how she hates me right now etc but she has accepted and is honoring it.

She has no where to go for Thanksgiving and asked if she was still welcome to my parents for the holiday. I told her yes that was fine. Now she is asking me to drive her son 2 hours to drop him off with his father for Thanksgiving week. I am thinking I should tell her no and that she needs to start figuring this stuff out on her own for when I am no longer in the picture.

I have been doing a pretty good job of detaching and not responding to the childish comments and have got better at saying, I am sorry you feel that way." I want so much to try to work on things but I know that distance and indifference are probably my best routes to take ATM.

Sorry for being all over the place. Their is so much more to add but I dont want to write a novel on my first post. Any thoughts and suggestions would be great.

Last edited by job; 11/12/19 03:51 PM. Reason: added space between paragraphs for easier reading
Slarty #2871875 11/12/19 01:14 PM
Joined: Nov 2009
Posts: 13,533
Likes: 78
C
Member
Offline
Member
C
Joined: Nov 2009
Posts: 13,533
Likes: 78
Welcome to the board

Sorry you are here but you will meet some wonderful people here and get some great advice.

Yes first thing you should do is be sure to read the Divorce Remedy (DR) book by MWD
http://www.mcssl.com/store/mwdtc2014/
http://divorcebusting.com/sample_book_chapters.htm

and Michele's articles
http://www.divorcebusting.com/articles.htm

You may be on moderation now, post in small frequent replies and stay on this thread until you reach 100 posts
(for your thread, you can also post on other peoples threads to give support).
Especially on this Newcomers forum, where the posting activity is very active,
and your posts can quickly fall to the bottom of the page or even several pages down.
Keep journaling and asking questions - people will come!
Most important - POST!

Get out and Get a Life (GAL).

DETACH.

Believe none of what he or she says and half of what he/she does.

Have NO EXPECTATIONS.

Take care of yourself, breathe, eat, sleep, exercise.

Take the parts of this advice that you need and don't worry if I have repeated something that you have already done.

Here are a few links to threads that will help you immensely:

I would start with Sandi's Rules
A list of dos and don'ts for the LBS (left behind spouse)
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2553072#Post2553072

Going Dark
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=50956#Post5095

Detachment thread
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2538414#Post2538414

Validation Cheat Sheet: Techniques and tips on how to validate (showing your walk away spouse (WAS) that you recognize and accept his or her opinions as valid, even if you do not agree with them)
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2457566#Post2457566

Boundaries Cheat Sheet
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2536096#Post2536096

Abbreviations
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2553153#Post2553153

For Newcomer LBH with a Wayward Wife by sandi2
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2545554#Post2545554

Resource thread
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forum...ain=57819&Number=2578224#Post2578224

Stages of the LBS
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=1964990&page=1

Validation
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=191764#Post191764

Pursuit and Distance
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2483574#Post2483574

The Lighthouse Story
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2484619#Post2484619

Your H or W is giving you a GIFT.
THE GIFT OF TIME.
USE it wisely.

Knowledge is Power - Sir Francis Bacon


Me-70, D37,S36
Slarty #2871897 11/12/19 06:12 PM
Joined: May 2018
Posts: 2,681
Likes: 2
O
Member
Offline
Member
O
Joined: May 2018
Posts: 2,681
Likes: 2
Sorry you're here.

Take back the master bedroom full time. She wants out she can get out.

Rethink Thanksgiving. She wants out, so why play family on the holidays?

Continue to GAL and detach. Don't react emotionally, think things through.

What happened between you two that you weren't sleeping together for a year?


H 34
W 29
BD 3/12/18
Divorce Busted Spring 19

It is not things that bother us, but the stories we tell ourselves about things.
Slarty #2871968 11/13/19 03:20 AM
Joined: Nov 2019
Posts: 15
S
Slarty Offline OP
New Member
OP Offline
New Member
S
Joined: Nov 2019
Posts: 15
Thanks for the tips so far. I had been distant with her the last year plus. Not showing her the attention and affection she wanted. I liked having the tv on at night in the bedroom and she didnt. My back hurt in that bed (I was fat and out of shape then) as part of my revival I have lost 50 lbs and work out 4 days a week. So those things madr it so I gradually stopped sleeping in the madter bed and let her take it over completely. It was my choice. We still had sex up until 2 weeks before the bomb but their wasnt a lot of intimacy.
I was also drinking 4 days a week during that last year. Mostly because of the direction our marriage was going in. I have stopped that too.
So she kept hounding me about driving her son up to VT to his fathers for Thanksgiving. It is a 2 hr drive and it would only be helping her out because my stepson doesn't even want to go. She wants me to do it so she is not inconvenienced with the drive and potentially losing money at work to get the time off to take him. I told her I wont have an answer until tomorrow at the earliest because I wasnt sure if I have plans or not. This was my text to her after she asked me to take him, "Unfortunately i dont know yet but if another day or two is going to make you miss an alternate plan then please go with that for the trip to vt." So her response was, Why cant u be decent about this, your off that day. Ur making me dislike u more and more, is that what you want?
So I didnt respond to that text. When she came home I told her I might have plans. Then she got angry. Then for the first time I brought up the fact that I knew that she was having an affair. I told her that i have too much self respect to let her own me by doing her bidding given what she is up too. I told her I wasnt going to wait around. That I make plans and go out and have fun.
I think Thanksgiving is too close to change my mind about now but heck, ahe might just excuse herself from the holiday for us at this rate.

Slarty #2872000 11/13/19 02:33 PM
Joined: Feb 2018
Posts: 9,822
Likes: 226
S
Member
Offline
Member
S
Joined: Feb 2018
Posts: 9,822
Likes: 226
Slarty welcome and sorry you are here.

"We hadnt slept in the marital bed together for the last year as things between us has not been good for a while."

This stood out. BD was a foregone conclusion. You should have been working on this for a year. Now you are playing her game with the nights away. I like the GAL, but go home at night. Do as ovr says and take back your MBR fulltime. Also, do as he says about thanksgiving. Why play the happy family because she doesn't want to sit home by herself?

I would highly suggest you look into Nice Guy Syndrome. Maybe read the book No More Mr. Nice Guy. I am detecting some passive-aggressive tendencies.

Slarty, I would do all of the reading cadet sent you. Valuable stuff. I would get Divorce Remedy and read it. The actions you should be focusing on are: GAL. 180ing (self-improvement), and detaching. Detachment is not distance or coldness. If that is the dynamic then you are doing it wrong. Cadet's reading above will help.


M(53), W(54),D(19)
M-23, T-25 Bomb Drop - Dec.23, 2017
Ring and Piecing since March 2018
Slarty #2872013 11/13/19 03:57 PM
Joined: Jun 2019
Posts: 214
C
Member
Offline
Member
C
Joined: Jun 2019
Posts: 214
Everything the others have said is true, though I would make one adjustment - while not sharing a bed for a year is a red flag, it's not just you who should have been working on your M, she should have, too. That's not to shift blame but I don't want you to feel more shame than you need to. If you are like me, and, as Steve pointed out, you may have some Nice Guy Syndrome (NGS) so that's like me, you take a lack of overt conflict as peace and overall "good". So, yes, you (and I) failed to identify and address issues that would be obvious to others, but so did our Ws.

I'm heartbroken for you - your W sounds like she's gotten a lot out of the relationship with you and is now walking all over you. I had a tough time cutting my W out of my family events - for a while I literally said that "I want us to be a family as long as we can, up until the day the papers are signed". Get out of that mindset as quickly as you can. She wants to leave, sleep with other guys, start a new life? Fine. No Thanksgiving with your family. It's not punishment, it's a boundary - she's firing you and, by extension, your family, she no longer gets to participate.

Beyond that, as you'll repeatedly hear, Get a Life (GAL) - do things that YOU want to do, go out, take a class, pick up an old hobby... whatever it is, do things YOU want to do for YOURSELF, not to show anything to your W. I'd recommend building a broader social network, go out with colleagues, take your kids to the park and meet other parents. If you've been dependent on W it's time to be able to let that go (it's being taken from you after all).


M(35), W(35), D(4)
M-9, T-12 Bomb Drop (D announcement) - May 3, 2019
W moved out Aug 13
House sold Sept 25
Papers signed Nov 15
Divorce finalized Dec 12
Slarty #2872028 11/13/19 05:25 PM
Joined: Feb 2017
Posts: 1,064
H
Member
Offline
Member
H
Joined: Feb 2017
Posts: 1,064
Quote
She said that we were done and we could go do and see whoever we wanted. She doesnt love me anymore and wants to move out in a few months once she saves up the money.

After 2 weeks of going out with her friends I find that she is having a physical affair with a guy she met out. I didnt blow up or expose what i know about the 2 of them. I had my blow up the 2 weeks before that when she told me she was done with us. I want to work on our relationship and i know it is a long hard road. She wont go to MC so i am seeing a counselor on my own.

She gets 2 nights a week to stay out overnight and i get 2 nights a week.


Youre new here, so you need to dive in and read as much as you can of the stuff Cadet posted, ask as many questions as possible, etc., but...

The above, to me, speaks volumes. She is done, done, done, done, done. She's not even making any bones about it: "We can go out and see whoever we want"... Really? She's your wife. Y'all have a family together. You are getting good advice from the others already, here, and you took a step in the right direction by "calling" her on her PA... but then again you already knew and she had already told you explicitly that she was going to do something just like that! She's told you the marriage is over. Which means you are no longer her husband, no longer there to bail her out or do nice little things for her... You've been "fired" (as sandi2 is fond of saying.) So #1, you dont try to nice up to her or cozy up to her and #2 you don't take any crap or disrespect from her. Respect, (you will find, if you read through sandi2's posts and threads) is crucial for a woman to feel love for her H... without it there can be no love and no hope for reconciling. That means you don't tolerate her yelling at you, abusing you, taking advantage of you, disrespecting you with comments like "Daddy's kissing other women" in front of your children... get my point? You should read up on "boundaries" in the stickied threads and consider setting some after you are comfortable with the concept. Boundaries are for you, but they are not just "demands" that certain behavior cease, but, rather, lines which, if crossed, will result in stated, predictable outcomes that you control. It is often a difficult concept for newcomers and can be hard to grasp and can be ineffective or even backfire if you do not fully understand how its done.

Also, good job on taking the back the MBR... I wouldn't even make it part time I'd go back there full time. She's the one who has dishonored the marriage and the marital bed, if someone is to leave, it should be her. Respect. Demand it. Calmly, firmly, without yelling, screaming, cursing, or insulting... but demand it.

Finally, not sure how fully similar your sitch is to mine given your W's background, this being a second marriage, etc., but my sitch did arise in the context of a "sex-starved marriage" and a lack of intimacy between W and I long before OM came into picture. It can be hard, as a LBH in such situations to understand the importance of detachment, pursuit/distance dichotomy, etc., since the "fix it" male mind naturally gravitates to "if distance and lack of pursuit and intimacy was the problem before, the fix must be to ramp up the attention and pursuit". This is not so, especially with WW's. One of the most profound and helpful quotes i have seen on these boards is "she will never find you so attractive as when you are walking away."

At any rate, I might suggest reading some of my own threads, if you're up for it, (my first one starts here: https://www.divorcebusting.com/foru...ain=60292&Number=2740576#Post2740576 ) but my saga was loooong, and my sitch (like anyone else's) had some very unique elements. But some cautions-- I screwed up a lot, didn't follow the playbook in some respects, and the path i took in some instances doesn't jive with what has typically shown to work and not to work. But if you read it with a critical eye, and keep in mind that 1) everyone's sitch is different and everyone's perspective is colored by their own sitch but also 2) that in nearly every sitch you will find similarities, inspirations, and other useful nuggets if you look close enough. In sum i guess i'd say: dont expect to "do what hoosjim did" or "do what Steve85 did" or "do what TxHubby did" word for word step for step and assume your life will come out perfectly. Youre unique and your sitch has unique elements. Try to find the common threads while at the same time staying true to the foundational bedrock DB-ing principles, and you should be fine. Anyhoo, I think i made it to like 15 or 16 threads before we finally made it the reconcilliation phase, so there's a lot of stuff in my thread to cut through. Yes, we made it, but it was long, and painful, and i can understand why many don't and then that even when some do get to that point the LBS decides "ya know, i don't need/want this anymore". It's hard, but not impossible, and there is hope... but it requires work, first, on you, and, then, if God and both of you are willing, on the MR.

Good luck, God bless, we're all here for you if you need us and we're all pulling for you.

Last edited by hoosjim; 11/13/19 05:29 PM.

H53/W51, R-ing 4/'18

"Do not arouse or awaken love until it so desires"-Sg.of Sg 2:7

"So oftentimes it happens,that we live our lives in chains, & we never even know we have the key"-Eagles III 1:3
crdcheck #2872032 11/13/19 06:26 PM
Joined: Feb 2018
Posts: 9,822
Likes: 226
S
Member
Offline
Member
S
Joined: Feb 2018
Posts: 9,822
Likes: 226
Originally Posted by crdcheck
Everything the others have said is true, though I would make one adjustment - while not sharing a bed for a year is a red flag, it's not just you who should have been working on your M, she should have, too. That's not to shift blame but I don't want you to feel more shame than you need to. If you are like me, and, as Steve pointed out, you may have some Nice Guy Syndrome (NGS) so that's like me, you take a lack of overt conflict as peace and overall "good". So, yes, you (and I) failed to identify and address issues that would be obvious to others, but so did our Ws.

I'm heartbroken for you - your W sounds like she's gotten a lot out of the relationship with you and is now walking all over you. I had a tough time cutting my W out of my family events - for a while I literally said that "I want us to be a family as long as we can, up until the day the papers are signed". Get out of that mindset as quickly as you can. She wants to leave, sleep with other guys, start a new life? Fine. No Thanksgiving with your family. It's not punishment, it's a boundary - she's firing you and, by extension, your family, she no longer gets to participate.

Beyond that, as you'll repeatedly hear, Get a Life (GAL) - do things that YOU want to do, go out, take a class, pick up an old hobby... whatever it is, do things YOU want to do for YOURSELF, not to show anything to your W. I'd recommend building a broader social network, go out with colleagues, take your kids to the park and meet other parents. If you've been dependent on W it's time to be able to let that go (it's being taken from you after all).


crd struck on something that I failed to mention. RESPECT

You start with respecting yourself. Do you respect yourself by not sleeping the MBR fulltime? No. So start respecting yourself.

Second, attraction for women is closely tied to respect. Once a woman loses respect for you the attraction goes with it. So this is why commanding respect is so important. This is what taking back the MBR is all about. I can't think of a single sitch here where the LBH gave up the MBR and successfully reconciled his marriage. Maybe there has been one, but I can't think of one. Taking back the MBR doesn't guarantee reconciliation, but not taking it back essentially guarantees against it.

So start commanding respect (NOTE: THIS IS DIFFERENT THAN DEMANDING RESPECT). Your W was mad when you came back to the MBR part-time. But you did gain a little respect back with that. However, you will gain a lot more respect by taking it back fulltime.


M(53), W(54),D(19)
M-23, T-25 Bomb Drop - Dec.23, 2017
Ring and Piecing since March 2018
Slarty #2872067 11/13/19 09:43 PM
Joined: Nov 2019
Posts: 15
S
Slarty Offline OP
New Member
OP Offline
New Member
S
Joined: Nov 2019
Posts: 15
So on the topic of driving my stepson 2 hours so he can visit his father for Thanksgiving week, should I tell my WW that it is her issue to figure out now or should I help out? Again it doesnt really benefit my stepson as he doesnt even like going to his fathers. It would be to make my WW life easier and the texts I got in response from her were manipulative.
The reason I told her I wasnt sure I had plans was because I was waiting on a call back from my counselor as to how I should proceed. My MC told me to tell her no that I cant do it. I have a lot of faith in what the board members have for experience here too so I would just like another perspective. Also any suggestions on how to have that convo would also be greatly appreciated.
Also in regard to spending the night out on my 2 nights a week that we had agreed to my MC suggest I not come home. But Steve85 here suggest I not play her game which has boiled down to her spending 2 nights a week at her APs house and go jome after my GAL session. Any thoughts here too? Sinve I stayed my last 2 nights she jumped to the conclusion that I was sleeping with another woman so I see where mybe my MC was wrong on me spending the night.

Slarty #2872072 11/13/19 09:55 PM
Joined: Nov 2019
Posts: 15
S
Slarty Offline OP
New Member
OP Offline
New Member
S
Joined: Nov 2019
Posts: 15
Also one more thought. I am not sure how hard of a line to take during this seperation as she left because of how unhappy she was with me. By taking a hard stance I am afraid I am not working on creating an environment she wants to come back to.

Page 1 of 4 1 2 3 4

Moderated by  Cadet, DnJ, job, Michele Weiner-Davis 

Link Copied to Clipboard