[How aware /conscious/ mindfull were you pre-BD? For example did you know about 90/10 rule, did you let your stress reactions (fight, flight etc) control your behaviour. Etc]

How aware /conscious/ mindfull were you pre-BD? For example did you know about 90/10  rule, did you let your stress reactions (fight, flight etc) control your behaviour. Etc

Not aware at all

8 (42.1%)

Slightly aware

6 (31.6%)

Moderately aware

1 (5.3%)

Lot aware

2 (10.5%)

Fully aware

2 (10.5%)

Total Members Voted: 19

[AlvinTheMaker]

This is the FEMALES ONLY version of the male's only poll I'm having at https://mlcforum.theherosspouse.com/index.php?topic=11148.0

I'm very much interested to see what kind of difference there is between the sexes.   

Same question, same summary for both... So it should make the results something we could put side-by-side.

Just something I've been thinking... About how happy our marriages were in reality.

The more I learn, the more I realize how little I have known (and how much better things could and should have been).

I'm bit ashamed to admit I was very much on the low end of the awareness scale.  I was very much drifting, letting my feelings and stress reactions run the show in good and bad. I was not putting much concious effort for my marriage.  It was all driven by monkey brains (at least on my part).

Maybe it's just me or maybe not (hence this poll), but I feel a lot of men are like I was - until something similar to BD shakes us awake and forces change to happen.

And yes, I know the options if slightly/moderately/lot aware are subjective and relative personal opinion of each.

There is no hidden agenda with this. I'm not seeking fault with myself or any other LBS.  Just a very plain and honest question - how aware/conscious/mindfull would you rate the pre-BD you compared to what you know now (of what relationships should/could be).

Self growth is all about change.   And I'm interested to see how much we (believe we) have grown.

[Thunder]

Alvin,

I haven't answered your poll yet because I'm not exactly sure what you are asking.

Maybe if you explain the 90/10 rule, it would help.
What did you mean by "fight/flight" controlling your behavior?  What behavior are you talking about?  I'm not sure I had any fight/flight feelings.
Sorry I just need some clarification.

I believe most people become complacent in their marriage, after 20/30 years together.
Both spouses are guilty of that.

This is a good article on how the can bring down a marriage:
http://www.markmerrill.com/complacency-the-subtle-and-silent-enemy-of-your-marriage

Are you asking if we were aware there was something wrong with our relationship, or marriage before BD, probably most people here would say no.

In hindsight, probably yes we will see how we could have done some things differently.
But none of us are mind readers.  If they don't communicate they are having problems with the marriage or are unhappy, how would we know this?

[Ready2Transform]

My xH and I were both deeply involved in the personal development field (my business is a content creator for it). Pareto's Law (80/20 version) was something we'd both studied and actively applied to different aspects of our lives. A coaching program we worked with talked about the role of the amygdala in decision making, and for awhile I blamed this for xH taking off (since we worked to become more comfortable with uncertainty). I had grown up reading self-help books and always felt it was my responsibility to "fix myself" from an early age. Still had an MLC myself, and clearly my xH did too, though these were new concepts to him.

[Anjae]

I was quite aware, so was Mr J. Not as aware as I become since, but quite and certainly more than most people we knew.

It made no difference. He had a MLC and so did I.

Doubt being aware will prevent MLC and MLC has little to nothing to do with awareness (ours or our spouse), spouse or marriage.

[lawprofessor]

Did I miss where Alvin said anything about level of awareness being a cause or driver to a spouse having a MLC or a suggestion that MLC could have been prevented if the LBS was more aware?

I took this question as going elsewhere, more of a moral inventory of the past and taking a hard look at his past behavior, and marriage in making himself, for lack of a better term, a better person.  Otherwise known as Mirror Work. 

An honest inventory and look at your marriage and self isn't about rewriting history, finding fault, or taking blame.  That what children focus on.  It's about being honest with self and facing things realistically with an eye to growth and self improvement.

So in that spirit I'll answer.

My awareness level was low.  I think that explains why I was so blindsided by his actions and why so many seem to miss noticing HB's first 2 stages in their spouse.  I know I did.

I had made some assumptions based on my moral expectations of where my relationship was headed.  I took those as a given and worked from there, and at times I was lazy.

1.  We had lived apart through deployments, (his work) so I assumed he shouldn't react any differently when we lived apart for my work.  After all I had been a good, faithful, strong military wife.  Shouldn't he do/react the same?

The answer is no

We weren't Siamese twins with the same history, fears, thoughts, foo issues, and experiences informing our behaviors. 

That's not to say I am the cause of his MLC.  It says I played an active part in my marriage for the good and the bad.

2.  I failed to notice that he was struggling, apparently with Depression, and PTSD from deployment.  I was busy with my part of life, building a career after putting my career on hold through a series of his deployments.  I was excited about the future.  I was focused elsewhere, thinking that the sacrifices we made early were worth the payout later.  And I had a right to be. 

That doesn't mean fault.  That means he and I were focused on different things.  We were at different parts in our lives.  His active duty career was changing from young fighter to training others.  I was the new fighter in my field.  My calls to him were full of excitement and I failed to notice he wasn't sharing my excitement.  But I have to be honest and admit my awareness was low. 

I am not saying I didn't have a right to be excited.  I'm not saying his reaction was right or mature.  I'm saying at that time in my marriage my awareness was low.

I'm saying I didn't notice so my level of awareness must have been low. 

And he deserved better.  As did I.

Again, not fault, just a straight forward honest look at reality.

That's not rewriting history.  That's being honest with one's self. 

The only way I could turn this into a positive and use this experience for growth was to focus on how MLC could make me a better person. 

It's fine to say we didn't cause the MLC.  BUT repeating that over and over is missing some points.

Presumably we were active participants in our marriages and our behaviors had an impact on our spouses, during the courtship, the marriage, as did our reactions to the various parts of MLC. 

Focusing on "Its not my fault" still puts the person as a victim of something and allows MLC to define ones life. 

What I know is in taking my moral inventory:

I was not a perfect wife.

I did the best I knew at the time.

I was an active participant in my marriage so I hold some responsibility for the good and the bad.

Nothing happens in a vacuum.  I played my part.  And that part is not defined as my playing the roll of victim in a Greek tragedy. 

I would do some things differently if I could go back in time but I can't so I'm not focused behind me but on learning and growing so I don't repeat history and make the same mistakes thereby wasting this opportunity even though I didn't want or deserve or ask for the gift of MLC. 

Focusing on the pain, living in denial of what the reality is, being a victim, these things only make this experience a waste of precious time we are given.  It is giving another control of our lives. 

I believe I have a responsibility to myself and my God to learn from my experiences and strive to be a better person each day.  Often times I fail, but I get up the next day and try again. 

I am not a Saint but neither am I Martyr.  Pretending or portraying one's self as either is a waste.

We have a choice to either sit down in hell or walk through it and come out having learned a few things.  Let MLC define us, or use this to define ourselves.  It's not a life sentence to pain unless we choose to see it as such. 

Mlc does not define my life but it was a point of redefinition, reevaluation, and growth in my life.

And one of those parts was to learn to be more aware.

My opinion.

Lp

[Anjae]

Did I miss where Alvin said anything about level of awareness being a cause or driver to a spouse having a MLC or a suggestion that MLC could have been prevented if the LBS was more aware?

There is an implication on the male LBS poll. That if he had been more aware he may had caugh thigs, made things different, etc.

We cannot be faulted by what is a personal internal crisis (personal and internal are self explanatory, aren't they?). It would be like being at fault because a spouse has depression or cancer. Or thinking a spouse addiction has something to do with us.

Not a question of victim, but of who is responsable/what belongs to whom. Mr J's MLC is his, not mine. I had mine and mine is mine, not his. It come with BD, but it is still mine. Mr J's MLC come with the death of his paternal grandmother. Hardly a matter that has anything to do with me or the marriage.

I was fully aware of his depression. So was he. He refused medical help. From then on nothing could be done.


LP, can you go by Caroline's thread? As an American lawyer you may know what she can do to protect herself. She has an abusive MCLer and is having problems. Thank you.

[Thunder]

Anjae I agree with you.

There is an implication on the male LBS poll. That if he had been more aware he may had caught things, made things different, etc.

None of us knew what a person, in crisis, was thinking.
There is nothing we could have done to stop this crisis from happening.

[lawprofessor]

Based on the recent history around here, I don't think it's wise to go with anyone else's assessment of a perception of another's writing without going straight to the source as I haven't forgotten RCR's recent post concerning reading into another's words even if someone "agrees"  with the perception.

I went to the thread and looked at what the writer Alvin himself said:

"No hidden hypothesis there, MBIB.

Just honest question.

Self growth is all about change."

Is there some reason the actual writer should not be believed when he was asked?  As I haven't been reading his threads I'm not able to know if he writes otherwise elsewhere from the poll thread.

Who is responsible and owns what in that MLC results sense is a separate issue to me and most here are aware that I feel the MLC person is 100% responsible for their actions, behaviors, words, and crisis having had a thread most recently covering exactly that.   

As I am 100% responsible for myself, my actions, triggers, reactions, behaviors and thoughts as the wife and the LBS regardless of MLC in my spouse. 

Both hold true not just in the MLC phase of the marriage but throughout the marriage in other words.

And I don't think and never thought I could have stopped his crisis so that's not relevant to my answer.

Alvin's question is not about responsibility for MLC to me.  As I said, it's about an honest moral inventory. Taking him at his word, which I'm forced to do because that's all I have to work with.   That and the fact it was not Alvin but Disillusioned who posted a vague comment saying saddened by all this and that it can/should be avoidable.  Which Alvin didn't agree or disagree with.  And he outright denied the hidden hypothesis by MBIB.

In doing my inventory, I looked at what I am/was responsible for throughout the relationship and made changes FOR ME, to the things I decided didn't fit me.  My focus wasn't on my MLCER but myself.

I'm sorry if you and Thunder don't see the difference.

You see, not everything in my view, need be simplified down to being discussed as related to MLC, whereas you two are talking through the lens of MLC.

My H was not in crisis through are whole marriage which is what I examined.  So I understand Alvin to be talking about the whole of his marriage and self improvement as his goal because he saw things he learned from. 

Again Mirror work,

not looking back,
not assigning fault,
not rewriting history
 and certainly not navel gazing at the past thinking the LBS could have stopped a crisis. 

But for his growth.

Because after all, just as the MLC is not caused by us, Mirror work isn't done to avoid or deny responsibility, assign blame, feed the sick fixer mentality that we could control another's crisis, or wallow in the past.  It's done to grow toward the future.

My opinion,
Lp

Anjae, thank you, I'll read up on Caroline's thread(s) and see if I can offer anything of substance.

[Treasur]

I agree with much of what LP wrote here.
I was 50% responsible for the marriage I had until my xh started his downhill run. I was not responsible for my xh's crisis or how he chose to deal with it or behave towards me. I was 100% responsible for how I responded to his crisis. I am 100% responsible for my own healing and my own life now. And that includes any lessons I think I need to learn or parts of myself I want to change.

The tricky bit is the ground in the middle imho between me and someone else's crisis.
That is about intention.

If I say that I did not cause my xh's crisis and could not have prevented it, then developing myself with the goal of anything to do with my then h's crisis or his post BD opinion of me is silly.
If I see things that this experience has shown me that I want to do differently in how I live my life and interact with others, that's useful mirror work.
But when the crisis behaviour is in your face or when as with Alvin you are living with it, it is easy to gaslight yourself. To think that if you communicate better or understand bonkers better etc, things will get better and you will slowly influence your spouse's behaviour. This rarely seems to be true.

Most of us here though were/are pretty good humans and pretty good spouses. Normal imperfect humans. Nothing inherently earth shatteringly terrible about us. Some have some old FOO stuff. Most have some damage from the experience. Choosing to be better does not mean we were bad before though. And I think it is important to remind ourselves of that bc our spouses often gaslight us and blame us and say horrible things to and about us....we need not to buy it just bc they are selling it. There may be some slivers of truth in what they accuse us of doing/being, but we need to detach from them to see thevwood from the trees.

Detachment makes it easier to separate our POV from their POV but harder to do when it is in your face every day. The likely fact that my xh thinks both me and our marriage were/are worthless and that it would be better if I was dead does not make it true for me just bc it is how he felt/feels 

There is nothing wrong with Alvin getting into his own head and learning more about what drives his behaviour and what he wants. The only thing I have prodded him on is that he should stay out of making that about his w's head or behaviour. If only for the simple reason that she has said so and no longer cares much what he thinks or feels.

[Disillusioned]

Alvin's question is not about responsibility for MLC to me.  As I said, it's about an honest moral inventory. Taking him at his word, which I'm forced to do because that's all I have to work with.   That and the fact it was not Alvin but Disillusioned who posted a vague comment saying saddened by all this and that it can/should be avoidable.  Which Alvin didn't agree or disagree with.  And he outright denied the hidden hypothesis by MBIB.

LP - great post.  I apologize if my comment was vague - that's a hallmark of my writing style!  LOL 

I did not intend to imply that being mindful in the marriage could have stopped MLC, if that's the way anyone took it.  My comment was more about the different ways men and women process life.  My W, definitely in MLC as the script is pretty constant these days, said a lot of things while monstering that struck home:  she didn't feel cheished.  She didn't feel seen.  Her emotional needs weren't being met. She'd been doing things her whole life for others...   Rather than ignore these comments as the ravings of a lunatic MLCer, I choose to focus on these insights into areas where I need to do my mirror work.  All of us on HS have spent countless hours reading the Gottman's, or Terry Real, or Gary Chapman or Esther Perel or hundreds of other current resources having to do with how men and women communicate in relationships.  My main take away from all that is that the "lack of awareness" in relationships is actually a lack of understanding in how the different sexes interpret and respond to each other.

Now, this may be a bit controversial, and I dont intend it to negate what I just said , it's more of an observation: I now believe that I went through a mild MLC.   It could have been an MLT.  Numerous factors, including my age, contributed to it.  However, one thing that was foremost in my head during those days was the lack of physical intimacy in my marriage.  It had been going on for a long time, and it eventually wore down my self esteem, my feelings of worth, my feelings of being desirable. My W, to this day, does not/will not accept how important physical intimacy is to men.  She  does understand how important emotional intimacy is to women, though. And that's where I wasn't mindful.  We were both doing things we thought were showing love to each other, but were completely missing the mark.  Obviously, this brings to mind the Love Languages theory to those familiar with that work.

Were we being the best we could be at the time, as you said?  Yes, I believe we were.  However, that doesn't stop resentment from creeping in when we feel our needs aren't being met.  When you finally break down, it doesn't stop the feeling that those moments of "neglect" or lack of "consciousness" were malicious.

My MLC was mild, but it wasn't short.  There was no affair, but I walked in the door one day a completely different person, as my W will tell you.  Argumentative, moody, complete shift in political affiliation.  Twitter and the Playstation were my alienators.    While I engaged in everything as a family and never stopped  loving my W, eventually I considered getting out.  It wasn't untiil she declared she wanted a D, and I found out about her OM, that I completely snapped out of it.  And I mean, SNAPPED out of it.  I am now thoroughly who I was when we met 20 years ago, with a few major improvements, mostly regarding the ways men and women interact.  The person I became during the marriage, all the blurred edges and enmeshments, is gone. The MLC version of me is wiped out.  At this point, my W and I are probably no longer compatible, but I still stand.

Did the lack of intimacy lead to my MLC?  Assuedly not.  Did it contribute to it?  It sure feels that way looking back.  One thing I am certain of, though:  I loved my W, and I know she loved me.  And our marriage could have been infinitely better if we had understood these basic differences between each other, and been mindful of each other's needs, because they are met in completely different ways.

My original, however vague,  point was that there are probably few marriages that are really, authentically happy, where both people feel genuinely that their spouse "knows" and understands what their needs are.  Maybe that's just being viewed through my own, cracked lens.  I think, however, based on everything I have read, that the situation is more common than not.  And that is what I meant by it being sad, and that a great deal of the unhappiness in marriages is avoidable. 

I hope this makes a little more sense.