[kalypso]

Dear forthetrees, thank you!

You're absolutely right that expecting my H's return is  not an option and I totally agree with you that MLCers "rewire" their brain and become different people. This is amazing and I have personally
witnessed it not only from my H but also from a very close friend of mine, who is having her own MLC (since her mother died).

But after 6 years of H being gone, I am not expecting him to return. Heck, even if he did all the work and un-rewired his brain and wanted to return, there are so many factors and problems that would make it (almost?) impossible. Still, not expecting does not mean that I do not wish that H returned, keeping in mind that this is not going to happen 99,9999%.

The fact that for the past 6 years I have been on my own with him not being my H, whether I wanted it or not, means, in my mindset at least, that I have accepted the rality of him leaving. Now I suppose you mean that I have not adapted good to this reality, and you are right! But not all people are the same and maybe I am one who cannot adapt to this better. I googled Radical Acceptance but I'm sorry to say that I didn't find anything new or catalytic. I like the saying with the barn and in my view I see myself gazing up the moon saddened by the ashes! I also do not believe that my sadness is a reflection of how much I love my H or caused my being addicted to it but is a direct, ecpected and normal result of him leaving. Also, I do not exclude joy from my life. I have moments of joy that I know is pure and real, unlike my H's "joy", that is made up and superficial. So I believe that he has suffered worse consequences than me by his decisions, because he had to "kill" himself in order to do what he did. And in my mindset there is nothing un-normal about my reaction to the situation, that I deem appropriate because I valued so much what I lost.

[forthetrees]

Might be worth looking into this, just swap out death for abandonment:

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/complicated-grief/symptoms-causes/syc-20360374

There is a path out of the morass.

[kalypso]

Thank you forthetrees!

You are once again right and clinically an expert should diagnose that I suffer from depression and that I fall into the defenition of complicated grief. But again that does not say much to me, because I realize it and have accepted it as an expected consequence. I realize the fact that my grief has exceeded the "norm" and is considered complicated but I do not believe there is (or should be) a cure for emotions that occur after such an event. I don't doubt that other people think differently and seek therapy, and that's their choice and good for them. But I don't. In any case, I have had treatment but did not see any results, as I said in my previous post. Paradoxically, while I was treated I was feeling worse. So I am not interested in looking for another therapist, but thank you again for trying to help me!

[xyzcf]

Also, I do not exclude joy from my life. I have moments of joy that I know is pure and real, unlike my H's "joy", that is made up and superficial.

Initially I went to traditional talk therapy for about 1  1/2 years. It was fine but did not really help me very much. Around 8 years post BD I felt stuck and I could not feel joy. I knew what joy was supposed to feel like, but I didn’t feel it.

 By chance, I discovered a therapist who as I said early is focused on trauma and mind/ body therapy. She really didn't focus on what had happened or at all on my spouse, it was a very different kind of therapy that worked for me and gradually put the pieces of me back together, and I began to actually feel joy again.


I agree that this is normal for us to feel this way. I was not broken before BD but this did break me for several years. I am grateful and realize how most people will not escape some kind of tragedy in their lives.

My father had PTSD from being a POWand for many years I wondered why he could not just get over it..it was in his past…but I now understand better… we can heal and have a very good life but healing means that there are scars that will always be there…..to deny that or force ourselves into believing that this is not the case, is perhaps denying reality.

Now some people can do that….good for them…..some can go on to other relationships and some profess that their new marriages are much better than the ones they had before…every one of us is different. We do get to know more about ourselves and out beliefs through this so growth occurs no matter what path life takes us.

[kalypso]

Thank you xyzcf!

I am busy frantically cleaning my house because workers leave a lot of mess! So my programme is upside down and we will not see my H. But I miss him terribly.

My father had a similar experience to mine, when my mother died. But he couldn't cope alone in raising me as I was 10 at the time. So he almost immediately started looking for a new wife, because he felt that he could fill the absence of mother&wife. I suppose it was an ok choice (although she cut all ties with me after his death), but I think that in anycase it was a hurried choice and one that he wouldn't make if he wasn't desperate about finding a new wife (he met her some months after my mothers death and they were married 1 year later, so 1 1/2 years in total). He always remembered my mother with love and if she hadn't died I doubt that he would give even a second glance to my stepmother (not meaning looks). Though he loved and treated excellently my stepmother, he was depended on her and in a (good) way he used her as a substitute. I believe that he never got over my mother's death. Being a mother myself, I would not want my child growing with a man that is not her father, as I think that only few exceptions succeed in doing what a father should. So even if I wanted to find someone else, I would have to search a lot, which I don't have the time or energy or rather wait my D to grow up.

[kalypso]

Today I laughed and felt sad and sorry not only for us (me and D) but mostly for my H. I realised once again how detached he is from reality and wondered again how he manages (?) to ignore the distruction he has caused and the absurdity and lack of meaning of his choices and current way of life.


As I mentioned, I have workers at my house for repairs. The workers were here bringing down pipes and sometime my H arrived. He knows I do repairs but he came without calling first (he has keys and comes and goes as he likes, I chose that, I know most here disagree but I think differently).

Now, as things stand, the only reason for him coming is to see D. And what does he do? He ignores the workers, goes to D's room just to say hi and then comes to sit by me at the balcony where I drink my tea. He does not talk to me (ok, he just asked when the works stop), he does not talk to the workers, but just sits scrolling his mobile for about 2 hours! In the meantime I cleaned, moped, gathered clothes etc. Sometime I came to the balcony again and I asked him what was the purpose of him just being there, as he is supposed to have come to see D. He said "she just stays in her room" (well, of course, it's not only because of the workers but she does not want him). Then he went again in her room and she asked him to leave. So he returned to the balcony and remained there for another 40 minutes scrolling on his phone. I was saddened and amused at the same time. What is this? How can he have let himself get so low? How can he not see the absurdity of the situation he has created? What is the purpose of him staying here for 3 hours, when everyone is ignoring him and all he does is playing with his phone? Does he come to mark his territory as cats do?! No meaning! I suppose OW was somewhere else and he thought, well, it's time to exercise my visiting rights? The other thing is that some of the works being done now he had done them himself (centuries ago), does it not bother him that others "disturb" his work now? And does he think that this "thing" he does is a father-daughter relationship? He only says hi, she sends him away and he comes to sit with me (not just now with the workers, this has been going on for the 2-3 past years!). I cannot understand how he has let himself get to this low state of being.

Does he really think that he has a good life? He has not one human bond (except OW, maybe she covers for everything!). He only talks with people on fb who he met on fb the past 6 years. He has no family, no money, lives on rent in a degraded area, he has debts (I don't know amounts), did not go for summer holidays. And what does he do? He just comes at his former house to stay for 3 hours doing nothing? Wow, this is entirely incomprehensible! Can someone please tell me if after 6 years it is possible for him to not realize how low he has gotten? Not for him to do something about it, but just if he has come to the realisation by comparing the now and before. His only purpose for us now is taking out the garbage and taking care of our cat whan we go on vacation. He has managed to diminish himself to that! And has the capability of posting stupid posts on fb just after our D has sent him away for the millionth time. Of course I still love him but cannnot help but pity him for what he caused, and I think he caused more damage to himself than to us.

[xyzcf]

Does he really think that he has a good life? He has not one human bond (except OW, maybe she covers for everything!). He only talks with people on fb who he met on fb the past 6 years. He has no family, no money, lives on rent in a degraded area, he has debts (I don't know amounts), did not go for summer holidays. And what does he do? He just comes at his former house to stay for 3 hours doing nothing? Wow, this is entirely incomprehensible! Can someone please tell me if after 6 years it is possible for him to not realize how low he has gotten? Not for him to do something about it, but just if he has come to the realisation by comparing the now and before. His only purpose for us now is taking out the garbage and taking care of our cat whan we go on vacation. He has managed to diminish himself to that! And has the capability of posting stupid posts on fb just after our D has sent him away for the millionth time. Of course I still love him but cannnot help but pity him for what he caused, and I think he caused more damage to himself than to us.

It is incomprehensible to us when we compare what they had to now. We look at their lives and think that things are not very good for them, from our "judgement" but as Ursa states, trying to understand them is like trying to taste the color green.

We do not know what is going on in their heads but I do think that they might not be able to connect the dots between before and after.....they exist in a "differerent" version of reality and have lost their connection to the person that was before and the things that mattered to them before the crisis hit.

The distance they have from their children helps us to understand that it is not us or our marriages that they turned away from....they have turned their backs on their whole world.

A small example, and there were several the past week as we were away as a family...our daughter lives in another country so this time together is special...I spent every moment I could with her and her husband.....the last day we were sitting on this VBRO deck on the river, my daughter, son in law and myself, a beautiful morning before we had to leave..he remained inside...several other times, he is focused on his phone, asleep on the couch or walking several yards in front of us. Refuses to play Skippo but wants to direct each of us how to play the game. It is bizarre.

He's perhaps incapable of finding his way into the "pack", I am not sure he "feels" things the way we do and even now, 15 years later, his eyes are lifeless.

Yet, he wants to be with us and consistently includes himself in these "family" times.

There really is no answer to the way they are, we cannot comprehend because we are not in a crisis.

In the long run, I do think the LBSer is in a better place. The theory of MLC was that if they were able to resolve their crisis, they were better versions of themselves after and that is true for a few cases....but many seem to have permanent changes that occurred with their "psychic break" and in my husband's demeanor, it's as though he is encased in stone.

[kalypso]

 Thank you dear xyzcf.

Unfortunately the situation is such as you describe it. What you eloquently wrote about your H being encased in stone really touched me. I feel the same about my H.When my H left I told him that his heart and soul were dry as a piece of dried leather.

I have an "update". Yesterday my D asked me to stay for the night at a friend's house and I called my H to ask if he agreed (he did). And then I asked him what he thinks about me being all alone with just my cat for company because of his choices. He tried to change the subject and talk about our D but I insisted that I want to talk about me, even on the phone, because for 6 years he hasn't had the guts to talk to me face to face. I asked him what would he do if he were in my place, if he is happy with his life, choices and their consequences. The answer he gave is a very well constructed story, based on facts, that could possibly persuade a stranger why he "had" to leave.

He fistly said that there is NO CHANCE for us to be a couple again (stab in the heart again ). He said that he wants us to be "friends", that he respects me, that I am a good person, wishes me well and doesn't hold anything against me (wow, thanks!), but we can NEVER be together again, because we are incompatible. I suppose that this is a version of ILYBINILWY? Because I didn't get it when he left. He said that I am a difficult person, anxious, stubborn and single minded, that I always want things to go my way, that I put too much pressure to him during my pregnancy and when our D was very little (all true, I admit, but greatly exagerated). He said he felt "trapped" and "like a slave" and he had to leave because he would always get angry with me, was tired of doing things my way (but for the previous 25 years wasn't) and there would be fights and he didn't want our D growing up with parents who fight (but we didn't fight, he fought himself).

So this is a very rational interpetation of the facts. But it is far from the truth. The truth is that when you want someone, when you have love and a family, these things he mentioned are not even considered problems but minor bumps that one easily overcomes because of love. When one really loves another they do not consider or count or hold against the other the compromises one has to do. Love doesn' t work that way.

He also said that the most important thing is freedom (what??? again???) and that I had deprived him of it ( ). So he described our prior relationship in terms of a transaction that doesn't satisfy him anymore. At first I was overwhelmed and felt (and still feel) like he stabbed me in the heart again when he ruled out any possibility of us together ever again. But when I thought better about the explanation he fed me with (which, I suppose, is what he has been rehearsing in his mind all those 6 years since he left, in order to convince himself firstly that what he did is reasonable - now I understand how he can live like nothing happened - he has persuaded himself that his constructed story is true), I realized that:

 1) He has is no feeling, no love, no compassion, no regret, nothing, just a superficial, rationalized, "logical" (?) interpretation of events, such that I would expect hearing from a lawyer who writes an appeal for divorce. So I think that unfortunately my H cannot feel anything anymore, or, as xyzcf put it, "am not sure he "feels" things the way we do and even now, 15 years later, his eyes are lifeless". That he does not feel also arises from the fact that, although he stated that he regrets missing so many things from our D, he does not try at all to change that. D does not want him, but he just ignores the fact, occasionally accuses me of it and does nothing about it. He also has not paid nothing for the past year (he got fired and found a new job 5 months ago). So he "knows" he should be feeling sad but doesn't have the capability of feeling it.

2) This is not my H, this is not the person I was with for 25 years, but a stranger. So either H (as I thought of him) never existed but managed to fool me for 25 years, or he did exist but "killed" himself in order to do what he "had" to do (he "had" to destroy our family?). In either case, the person who was talking to me was a stranger. As xyzcf eloquently put it, "they exist in a "differerent" version of reality and have lost their connection to the person that was before and the things that mattered to them before the crisis hit".

So I see little consolation to the fact that it is not my H who betrayed me but this new person, who just looks a lot like him. And in a way it's better that I made him tell me all these things, because I realise that I definately do not want someone who deems the best years of my life as a waste of time. He really said that he was like a slave and that he was relieved when he left. So now I know that he is unworthy of the family and blessings he had. And he is right in thinking that we are totally different, but not in the way he thinks. The only difference that matters is that he thinks it's ok to throw your family in the garbage and I do not.

 So clearly he is still in the "fog" (I'm not sure I still believe in MLC) and I firmly believe with no chance of changing. I was crazy and naive enough to believe (ok, hope) that after 6 years he would have realized the stupidity of his choices and I thought that maybe he is ashamed, so why not ask him? I know I'm a fool and that his way of thinking is totally different now. I'm still raw after our conversation. I don't know if what he said will make me change anything, but I don't think so.

I also have a few funny observations to make. When he said that we are incompatible, I asked how come we weren't for 25 years? He said that the circumstances didn't create problems then (? I suppose he meant that I was extremely anxious with our D) and he stated that he cannot be with someone who wakes up so late (

I also asked him what he thought would happen if I got married again (I do have a marriage proposal that I'm not accepting of course) and H answered "I cannot forbid you" 

At some point I told him that I' m the only one in this house who still wants him and that it isn't me who should be asking him to reconsider, he disagreed and said that it should be me begging him to return 

So, another update with no change to my situation, and I firmly believe that there will not be a need for another as nothing will change from him. I am going to get busy with repairs at home. May God give courage and peace to all.

[Treasur]

Sometimes we LBS need to keep touching the hot stove for a while. Sometimes for longer than we might wish and more often perhaps than makes sense even to us.
Until we don’t.

But until then, we often ‘create’ reasons for contact. I can’t recall if you are legally divorced, but you have certainly been separated for quite some time. From the cheap seats, it’s unusual I think that you would seek his agreement to your D having an overnight when she is with you - does he do the same when she is with him? How does visitation/custody work right now? What does your version of co-parenting look like in practice?

Any chance that your real reason for contacting him was bc there were things you wanted to say? Or ask? Bc it sounds as if you rang for one explicit reason but then quickly took the conversation to one that was more about wanting him to feel sorry/compassion for you and wanting to hear something else from him. Do you know what that was exactly?
And it sounds as if that wasn’t what you got.

Is there an MLC type ‘script’? Yes. Does it make sense to we LBS types? Probably not. But imho that doesn’t invalidate the reality (for them) of someone else’s POV, whether we think it’s right or not. Your h has his ‘story’ about why he felt ok enough to do what he did. For most LBS, we eventually reach a point when we accept the reality of what happened (even if we don’t understand it or agree with it) and turn our attention to our own ‘story’ whatever that is. And when we do, these kinds of conversations tend to lose their appeal bc they rarely give us anything useful.

It’s normal I think to search for answers and closure or clarity. But that is rarely what we get. Or we don’t like what we get.
I hope this latest conversation with him gave you what you felt you needed and that the cost of it was not too high. You’ve heard his ‘story’…..the more important thing now imho is what you decide is your ‘story’ from here on.

[kalypso]

Hello dear Treasur and thank you!

I am probably at a stage where I like to touch the hot stove!

He left 6 years ago but we are not legally divorced. He only comes to our house to see D (really to sit by me and play with his phone), he doesn't take her to his place. I always ask him his opinion about most things concerning our D, not because I want to create reason for contact but because I feel that I should. I value his opinion and think that he should know these things as a father (even if he doesn't act like one!). He also asks for my opinion but sparingly since he does not do anything alone with D. There is no co-parenting, there is only one parent -me! He's just a visitor who takes out the garbage and takes care of our cat when we are on vacation. But I don't treat him as a visitor (ok sometimes I do).

You are right that I quickly took the conversation elsewhere, because besides asking his opinion about the overnight I took the opportunity to ask him these questions that are always in my mind and I was feeling I would burst!. I didn't want him to feel sorry for me, I wanted answers because after 6 years I foolishly thought that he surely must have repented!  Well, I didn't obviously hear what I wanted, but at least I have some info about his state of mind and that he remains an alien. And a little consolation from the fact that the person I talked to was not my H, who is "dead" or never existed!

There has been NO conversation between us and about us since he left, because the first year he would not answear and then I stopped asking.

I don't yet know the cost of hearing his "story"! I'm still raw and besides I have plenty of work with the house repairs. I also cannot predict if his answers propel me to change course, but I think not! We will see!