[WHY]

Everyone faces a crisis at some point in their lives.  It’s a question of character when it comes to how you deal with it.

LBS could just as easily implode.  Nope.  Hard pass.  There’s so much more to life.  ONWARD!

[forthetrees]

The self-reflection part is key so that you know what blame came your way legitimately for aspects you can modify and what blame came your way for nothing to do with you. It´s worth keeping in mind that HeartsBlessing was generous in her contributions to the forum but she espoused an approach whereby she often posted what she said that God had told her directly. So, maybe take it all with a grain of salt.

[keepfighting]

Thanks for all your comments. I was able to find good advice in every one of your comments, so I am very grateful.

It´s worth keeping in mind that HeartsBlessing was generous in her contributions to the forum but she espoused an approach whereby she often posted what she said that God had told her directly. So, maybe take it all with a grain of salt.

The more I read her posts, the more I can see this myself. Whilst I can accept that God speaks in ways to people, she almost positioned herself as a profet, I don't believe we had profets recently sent by God.

People tend to just “live life” on auto pilot, where life is just happening to us and around us, and frankly, that’s how a lot of us ended up here in the first place.

As much as I hate to admit this, I can see myself in this sentence. With 3 kids and no external help (we are living away from our families in a foreign country), we were fully consumed up by the day-to-day activities, work, etc. We always spend the weekends together as a family, but W and I had very little quality time together, where we just focused on the two of us. I raised this with her recently, and the answer I got is 'we spent way too much time together, you are driving me mad, I cannot have you standing around me', well, from the tone you could guess this was post BD 

LBS could just as easily implode.  Nope.  Hard pass.  There’s so much more to life.  ONWARD!

I am not a person who easily gives up, that's something I am trying to teach my kids to follow. At the same time, as many people here advise you need to approach this situation with a dose of reality and accept that one of the outcomes is that we will never reconcile.

Personally, I think as a stander you need to find strenght to keep up the fight in every opportunity. I decided to honor my vows and I am also relying on the fact that, after one of our 'talks' that turned into more of a verbal fight, she asked me not to leave her. I know I know, no expectations, lol, but I fealt this was said by the real person inside, more of a scream of the prisoner.

She always positioned her situation as something temporary or transitional, saying it's caused by her hormones and she thinks we were destined to grow old together. Not confusing at all, lol!

Anyway, these are comforting thoughts, but I know I cannot fully rely on these to keep fighting.

W accepted or said herself, I cannot remember now exactly, that she will take a blood test that examines her hormone levels, this is scheduled for mid Dec. We'll see if anything comes out of this. She has older friends that said they were going crazy and it turned out their hormones needed 'compensation'.

In fact, I could find very little debate on what hormones play in this whole mess overall. She is 42, so perimenopause is not out of the question at all.

[keepfighting]

Now a bit of journaling:
The weekend was awful, Friday & Saturday I had the honor to meet the Monster again, I was told many things, some more seriouos than others, amongst others that she wished I would choke and die.

I did not take it personally, thanks to tools, advice and knowledge I have now. I just responded where necessary and not reacted. The one thing I regret is that this happened whilst we were in the car in front of our children. I asked my W repeatedly not to bring up this subject in front of the kids, did she listen? Of course not. This was probably seen as me controlling her, don't know.

We were on our way to an exhibition, W being an artist she wanted to go and I bought the tickets a couple of weeks back when we were a bit closer. Anyway, we went and to my surprise she thanked me that I took her. This was after 3 minutes of some more spew I got, it was a very long day and I just wanted to get home, she got upset that we always run home. Responded, not reacted.

Surprisingly, the next few days were quiet. She acts normal, is kind with the kids, smiles a lot,  even came with us when I went swimming with the boys.  To my surprise she wanted to come with me in the SPA (I did not ask), where we had a nice neutral conversation.

I could clearly see her cycling. She still goes out most of the nights once the boys are in the bed, spends 1.5-2h away than she returns. I say nothing, ask nothing, not when she leaves, nor when she returns. It hurts when she leaves, not as much as it used to, but I am getting used to it. Keep reminding myself, you have to let her go. W still spends a lot of time on her phone, chatting, not as much as she used to maybe, I try not to focus on this aspect anymore. Tuesday was particularly bad for me, I was emotionally down.

I keep my distance, if she talks and asks me things I reply, but don't usually initiate discussion.

One thing I made clear to her is as she wants her freedom, and denied me as her husband (she still wears the ring btw), it's time for her to get a job and ensure she can support herself. I've tried to set deadlines for her getting a job, but it did not work and tbh, from my own experience it's not easy to find a job nowadays. I have a boundary in place, that any money she spends, it must be solely for the benefit of our family and not herself. Anyway, she started looking into the job market and identified a few job opportunities that she wanted to apply for. In the process, asked my help to write her CV and job applications. Initially I was reluctant to help her, just gave her the laptop and said here's your CV, here's your cover letter, now you go away and do the work. She was struggling and came to me for more help. It just dawned on me this morning if this is maybe a good opportunity to show her my support and 'strength' that I keep reading about the MLCer needs to see in her LBS. With no expectations for now, if we get to the stage where she will turn inside and try to think of her situation and she compares me to the OMs, the fact that I helped and supported her surly will work in my favour.

You will probably smile and say newbie again, W recently said, she's aware that she has a diamond in her hand but she is still looking for stones, this was in reference to her quest for men. It was a nice thing to hear, but knew meant nothing as a few minutes later she was on her phone texting OMs. How crazy this all is!


Overall, she seems happy, acts like nothing out of the ordinary is happening in our life, which I find difficult to accept but try not to show. I can clearly see that she wants to spend time with us as a family, laughs a lot with the children, looks after them, cooks nice meals from time to time and again annoyingly acts as if not much have happened, tells me jokes about the dog, etc. In these moments I just withdraw as much as I can. 

[Treasur]

You will probably smile and say newbie again,

Well yes, but with love 
And cheering you on as your words show how your lens is adjusting.

I think your post gives a good example of a couple of things that most of us struggle with initially; dealing with behaviour we find unacceptable and how we respond when asked for help or support. Or boundaries and detachment in real life practice.

You did well to not take your wife’s childish abusive spew in the car personally, well done you.
In future, I hope you might consider other options too bc it’s not necessary to be a receptacle for this kind of behaviour either….one wins no karmic goody bags for it lol. Stop the car and suggest she finds her own way to the exhibition if she can’t control her tongue. Or turn around, go home and take your kids out someplace else without her to name just a couple. You may find yourself feeling less of a desire to ‘treat’ her to these kinds of outings in future, of course…..

On the cv etc….hmmm, I suppose one might argue that her being financially self-supporting is in your own interests. But it’s a newbie brain hiccup imho to think that being ‘helpful’ or ‘supportive’ or ‘kind’ might be appreciated imho (see spew above  ). It seems to be a universal truth post BD that if your LBS fingers are near anything, it’s your fault if it goes wrong and nothing to do with you if it goes well. Your wife is a sentient adult with more experience than a 16 year old, even if she’s a poor quality human right now….she has friends, family, acquaintances, OM probably, lots of free info on the internet, job coaches etc etc….is it not her challenge to figure out and learn by doing so? Or are you intending to play the role of future Fixer forever to a potentially xw….? I’m being a bit blunt, I know, but it looks like a huge lose-lose bear pit to me and it’s not uncommon here to see that quasi parent -child dynamic with LBS and MLCers. Not uncommon either in a relationship for one person to over-function when the other under-functions - was this an old pattern pre BD albeit on a smaller scale? What were your other options and what do you think might have happened if you had deployed some of them?

I would humbly suggest that if she is adult enough to trash your marriage and family arrangements in search of her new ‘better’ life, she is adult enough to figure out how to deal with the challenges and predictable consequences of it without expecting you to smooth her path to a new life with OM and/or without you. And that you may be instinctively playing out an old default pattern for you with her which no longer serves you well in a changing situation if you do.

And just in case you need a reminder bc imho, in any healthy adult relationship, some level of resoect and reciprocity matters, you said this in your first post…

She is mean to me, making remarks about she thinks needs to leave me as she cannot take the pressure anymore. It was not the first time she said she is going to leave me, everytime I got rejected at a job interview she made sure to stick it in my face that she is leaving. Exactly what I needed at the time.

It’s pretty uncomfortable for both LBS and MLCer imho when we stop or change old defaults….but arguable that the old defaults were part of what got you here and are unlikely to get you anywhere different in future perhaps? And to reflect on the payoffs you get from doing it which are not always tbh as completely shiny or generous as we might wish….control, ego, being ‘right’ or ‘better than’, possessiveness, impatience, feeding dependence bc it makes us feel safer if we are needed, whole bunch of squirmy things lol ... its’s remarkable how often MLCers, at least initially, want help or support and equally remarkable how often they manage just fine with all kinds of stuff without us while we are on our knees without much help at all 

Just a thought to chew on….not the end of the world, but worth a muse as part of your own growth maybe?

[keepfighting]

Thanks Treasur,

Again useful insight into things and I feel you are trying to anchor me into reality and stop me from thinking too much ahead. Without intending to offend you, I feel you are a glass full empty person which is understandle given the pain and grief you went through.

I just feel I need things to hold on to at this stage to give me strength to continue this journey I was forced on. While reading through your reply, just the thought that she might not need me on day to be next to her and help her made me sad, very sad. Oh how I wish this was just a temporary divergence in our journeys. Guess time will tell...

[Treasur]

Not offending me at all 
Actually it’s rather interesting feedback to hear how others see us. I used to be a full glass kind of girl, that’s true. Now? I think I move around but my core is that optimistic full-ish glass so I usually return to that.
I think what changes (and changed for me) is what I hang my optimism on nowadays. Different hooks for my hat 

I am having a sad day today. Clearing out some old files (which was necessary) but a bit heart wrenching all the same, so how funny (and rather lovely) that you could sense how my glass was through the ether! I took a walk as the sun went down, enjoyed the Christmas lights on my little village high street, kicked my way through some autumn leaves in my wellies and now I feel much better 

I do understand that need to only swallow what you can swallow at a given time. That’s human and normal. If they might be useful, stick my questions in a drawer until or unless. When/if you’re ready, you’ll know.

[mcm64d]

Glad to hear your evening turned around Treasur!!

[keepfighting]

It's nice to have your day ending in good mood. I just played two sets of tennis with my youngest son S8, it's so great to see his enthusiasm for tennis. He's got a strong drive and wants to make it to Wimbledon.

I'm just chilling out in the spa. Keeping active helps me clear my head whilst also keeps me away from home.

I miss the family dinners together though.

[keepfighting]

Very useful reading from user BBHelp, who lived with an in-house MLCer and he journaled his journey
https://mlcforum.theherosspouse.com/index.php?topic=8080.0