[Acorn]

Thank you, Marvin, for your insightful post.

we actively CHOOSE to invest our emotional energy and resources rather than passively.

I call that ‘Loving (love-ing) is a choice.’ 

I personally find the ‘hormone’ talk rather revealing, and so are:

‘Alien is controlling my spouse’
‘This is MLCer persona talking, not my real spouse’
 
And, so on. 

In my view, one of the underpinning ideas behind these phrases is about (unintentionally, I’m sure) diminishing accountability on behalf of the spouse, not that thinking that way actually accomplishes that for an entirely separate and sentient human being.  One can deduce then, this way of looking at MLCer serves LBS in one way or another.  It soothes something in him/her. I suggest it is about LBS’s needs. Not a bad thing to contemplate about.  I’ve been there, too.

I would also add that a person is a total sum of who he/she was and is and all the facets of themselves they present according to the time, place, people, situation, etc.  It is a package deal.  You wouldn’t want to cherry pick the stuff you don’t like or want to accept and then attribute them to something else.  That is a fruitless mental gymnastics.

[Reinventing]

In my view, one of the underpinning ideas behind these phrases is about (unintentionally, I’m sure) diminishing accountability on behalf of the spouse, not that thinking that way actually accomplishes that for an entirely separate and sentient human being.  One can deduce then, this way of looking at MLCer serves LBS in one way or another.  It soothes something in him/her. I suggest it is about LBS’s needs. Not a bad thing to contemplate about.  I’ve been there, too.

Good point that is layed out clearly. Worth thinking over. How do we position the weird similarities in our experiences and yet acknowledge that the MLCer is a separate, autonomous, adult human being?

[Nas]

I’ve been there, too.

It might not seem like very much, but I was thinking how often we say this very sentence in some form or another. “Been there, done that….” “ I did the same exact thing…”
“That’s exactly how I felt…”

We all do the same things.

MLCers in the onset of unraveling behave in remarkably similar ways. LBS respond in remarkably similar ways. We’re all just human.

Human behavior is often very predictable even in those situations where we never could have predicted it. There is a reason why we can cite so many terms like projection and denial, cognitive dissonance, regression, snd we can see how they apply in each situation.  When the psyche fractures, we see “parts“ of another person that we never saw before. But the psyche contains the unconscious and the conscious, and since we can never fully know another person, and we can absolutely never know another person‘s unconscious self, when the psyche fractures, we see something that appears to be a person we don’t know.

IMO, rather than being “alien,” a person in crisis might be said to be something more like “hyper-human.” We see parts of them that we never could have imagined existed. But it is them. A version of them. Some things in life are hard to admit, and that’s one of them.

[Reinventing]

I've read what you and Acorn wrote multiple times to better understand this. I'm going to attempt to rephrase it as a learning exercise, so freely comment/correct.

The pressures of arriving at midlife and viewing the inevitable end brings to the fore parts of a MLCer that previously were hidden. The pressures may include feeling like they haven't attained what they thought they would at this stage of their life, or unresolved issues from their childhood, or being tired of suppressing their wants for so long and seeing this as a last chance to act on them.

So they unravel and act on those parts of them. From this site, most people suppress wanting attention, sex, relationship(s) with others. Most people want to not worry about money and buy new things they didn't allow themselves to buy before. Most people want a new profession.

So they act on these things. Why lie, cheat, and come up with ridiculous reasons for doing this? Why blame the LBS and abandon children? Why do some people not succumb to these parts of themselves?

Why do some re-suppress these parts of themselves and reconcile?

[marvin4242]

Why lie, cheat, and come up with ridiculous reasons for doing this? Why blame the LBS and abandon children? Why do some people not succumb to these parts of themselves?

I know the question was not for me, but I want to share my belief on this part. We have a false idea that what we call the "self"is this coherent well designed construct. It is not. We really are a collection of somewhat independent forces, some from more instinct driven and "core" drives (what you can generally consider behaviour motivators or action forces) and memory/learning/projecting into future by learning from past higher functions that evolved over time that act as regulators (or break/halt systems). The overall behaviour we exhibit is the net balance of these conflicting forces. And empathy/caring for others also acts as an important regulator/selector.

Now imagine if someone suffers some form of psychological crises and these forces no longer balance. And due to extreme internal pressure and pain some of the components no longer operate as before (like memory, empathy, and ability to experience others as separate from the self). You are left with a hodgepodge of behavioural trains that take over and come to the front to the exclusion of others. Rage is a good example. We all feel anger but it is mostly modulated by understanding and care and sometimes just not wanting to seem like an a**hole.

So you are watching a fragmented kaleidoscope of mostly more core behaviours (instant gratification from sex/spending and behaviours you see in teenagers, because they have not yet fully developed the balancing portions), but the kaleidoscope view is not stable. So what we experience can shift dramatically. Its like a hall of mirrors.

If they know what they do is painful to others, but can't reconcile that or won't stop themselves blame and anger can act to modulate or compensate for the guilt.

[WHY]

But the outright hatred / contempt for the spouse...  That’s the only part that doesn’t add up. 

[marvin4242]

But the outright hatred / contempt for the spouse...  That’s the only part that doesn’t add up.

One explanation is a version of transference of their own guilt, anger and hate onto the person closest to them. I saw it clearly in my W where she accused me of causing her things that were directly result of her own choices. I believe ironically because they felt most safe and close to us we become the easy target, kind of like a child acting out with safe parents.

[Biscuit]

The parent - child analogy is a good one I think Marvin.

How many of us said hurtful things to our parents in our teenage years and didn’t mean what we said or realised how upsetting it might be to our parents….. exactly the same in the case of an MLCer who generally appear to lack emotional maturity

[Treasur]

But the outright hatred / contempt for the spouse...  That’s the only part that doesn’t add up.

‘If it’s not my fault, it must be yours….and that’s much less uncomfortable than it being mine’ is my best take on this. Blaming someone or something else is a pretty common way for humans to avoid looking in the mirror and holding ourselves accountable for creating or tidying up our own mess, isn’t it? A lot of humans find anger easier than sorrow or shame. And contempt is what allows us to dehumanise people sufficiently to justify treating them poorly without feeling the empathy or compassion that woukd demand more and better of us.

At a deeper psychological level tbh, I suspect this is also how people whose sense of self is overly attached to another, and who no longer value that ‘self’, sever that attachment in some cases ; a rather violent burning of bridges without much middle ground.

Writing this, I am still reminded though that it really has very little to do with me as a person. Or you. That one is just acceptable (to them) collateral damage in their own strategy for attempting to make themselves feel better. I guess it makes sense that this would continue if they do not magically feel better lol, although most LBS here find that puzzling when it seems that they have got what they wanted, right? But again, that’s not uncommon based on stories here, is it?

Once I got past the ‘this can’t be happening’ and ‘my h has been replaced by an alien’ stage - which took a really long time for me lol - my version of trying to make sense of what made no sense to me came to be based on two relatively simple principles.

The first was that none of us can ‘know’ what someone else really thinks or feels and it’s an arrogant folly to think we do, particularly if we want to believe something which is at odds with what their behaviour looks like. Yet we humans are patterning creatures and any long close relationship is based on assumptions about those repeating patterns….everything from small things like someone not liking cheese to big things like how they behave as a parent. We are biologically wired to believe that a person tomorrow will be much like they were today, so it’s a bit of a shock to the system if they suddenly start eating cheese after hating it for twenty years!

So, for instance, if someone behaves as if they do not care about us, it’s reasonable to assume that’s because they do not care about us but we struggle with that for a while bc it doesn’t fit that recognisable pattern. We may not understand why. It may feel unfair or irrational that they do. But it is the simplest explanation. Yet it is often so painful to see this that it is easier, at least for a while, to construct some kind of denial box around it…..and imho that’s an inherent weak spot in going too much into the ‘MLC made them do it, it’s not the real them’ argument.

And on the issue of the ‘real them’ - and indeed the ‘real me’ lol - my second principle became that it is indeed like a child’s toy kaleidoscope. That behaviours don’t come from nowhere but new situations twist the kaleidoscope into a different pattern, sometimes a pattern not seen before.

I learned that when I am alone, grieving and afraid, my kaleidoscope became a cave I hid in, disabled by sorrow and grief, like a small child. I don’t much like that picture and if you had asked me before this experience, it would not at all have been recognisable to me as who I am or how I thought of myself. Yet it turned out it is, in the right combination of circumstances. My recovery required me to make peace with that pattern as part of me….and I couldn’t change the pattern until I did. Which took years for me 

On the same principle, I learned that my xh’s kaleidoscope pattern in his own set of circumstances was more cruel, more angry, more deceitful and more avoidant than mine was…he did things that I found, even in extreme circumstances, were just not in my mix…..but they were in his, and that was his way of dealing with the situation he felt he was in, just like my metaphorical cave was mine. Both imho are part but not all of who we are.

I have no idea if my xh, or your xw, find that pattern sufficiently uncomfortable to live with that they made peace with it in order to consciously change the pattern. If they did, it makes sense to me that this might take years for them as well. If not, perhaps they find the new pattern easier than I did or their circumstances changed sufficiently that it gave their kaleidoscope a third and different twist, idk. But it makes sense to me that, even if some internal crisis twisted his kaleidoscope into something unrecognisable to me, that version of my h is who he is when he wants to leave a long marriage and prior life. If he ever finds himself in a similar situation again, it is likely that he will find himself doing much the same. Bc none of the new kaleidoscope pattern was about me at all…..it was his way of dealing with the situation as he saw it. And like most humans, without effort or insight, if we find ourselves in a similar situation, we tend to repeat what we’ve done before, don’t we? Well, unless it becomes blindingly obvious that what worked before won’t work now lol….which is I think part of the unpicking that most LBS here find themselves going through.

What does that all mean imho?
I think it means that there is some benefit to the ‘quacks like a duck’ principle when it comes to seeing other peoples kaleidoscope patterns. And that often the simplest solution is the most likely, even if we don’t understand why a goose has become a duck. We don’t need to in order to see a duck in front of us, quacking away just like a duck. I didn’t need to understand my xh’s indifference to see it. You don’t need to understand your xw’s contempt or anger to see it. And then, once one sees it, one can choose what to do about the quacking duck. Or not.

More importantly, and more usefully probably, I think we LBS need to look hard - and with a very kind and encouraging eye - at our own LBS kaleidoscope pattern. To see what this experience created in us including things that perhaps we did not know were in the mix that might show up given the combination of a certain set of awful circumstances. I don’t know what your own kaleiscope looks like now, Why, but your unresolved questions might be part of it? And how to make peace with that as part but not all of who we are. And then to decide how, or if, we want to give our own kaleidoscope a twist to create another different pattern. If only bc that IS something we can do something about. Other people’s kaleidoscopes, not so much 

As always, for all of us, jmo and a sample of one lol.

[Dragonfly33]

You hit the nail in the head Treasur. I was one of those who kept insisting MLC made him do it. My IC told me straight away my exh might have MLC but those hurtful and harmful things he did that cause me so much pain were his conscious choices. He was not in trance or sleep walking that he didn’t know what he was doing or wasn’t aware that he was hurting people. It also took me a while to accept this. For a long time I defended my ex to my family and friends and even to my therapist that he was in crisis that’s why he did all those things. It was easier to soothe your ego doing this than accepting he didn’t care about me anymore. I believe my exh is in MLC but he is accountable to those bad choices he did. Those are his choices. He did those things even though he knew they would hurt me. That for me is clear now. He is capable of hurting me in a profound way and people who truly love you wouldn’t do these things. Loving is a choice backed up with actions.