Does anyone have any insight as to when the rewriting of the relationship is ever reversed? Is this only at the end of the whole process?
You might want to read the recent post by Limitless sharing her latest update 10+ years later…..
Imho one of the ‘risks’ of focusing a lot on MLC as a cause is that it can lead some of us to assume that progress through a set of ‘stages’ - and therefore ‘recovery’ - is a given. There are quite a few anecdotal examples here suggesting that a) such progress might not happen at all and b) if it does, it can take years, decades even. You are in your 30s with a 5 year marriage that you said has been off- kilter for a couple of years, right? There may be some things you want to do with your life that are not contingent on his progress, or not, that are not about his story but your own. If his narrative changes, you can always adapt accordingly after all.
None of us here can be magic mind readers, can we? So, many of us don’t know if that rewriting ever evolves in their heads. In my case, my xh is long gone, so I have no idea. It hurts, of course, and is rather confusing to hear someone claim adamantly that up is down when our own experience was so clearly the opposite. I think you can see clearly though - which is no mean feat, so well done 😝- that if blaming you/others is still in the mix, there’s not much useful that you can do with that.
Most of us LBS naturally go through our own process over time of working out for ourselves what we think was really up and really down regardless of what they say. The danger imho, particularly in these early days where you are, is buying too much of what they are selling, of blaming ourselves for things we had no control over or that are just not reasonable to expect of ourselves. Of seeing something as ‘the’ truth as opposed to ‘their’ current truth. Of assuming that this MLC thing necessarily has a beginning, middle and end and gambling todays wellbeing on an unknown tomorrow that we simply can’t foresee or control.
What does it mean for you if he never changes that rewritten story? And why does his story matter to you, do you think?
Again jmo but I think one of the reasons why reducing contact can be helpful to some of us in the first year or so is that it reduces the mental ‘noise’ from them that seeps into our heads. As Reinventing said, that gives us the chance to ‘right our own ship’ without being so frequently buffeted by someone else’s winds. I certainly found that my healing did not really start until I was off the metaphorical battlefield. And you can trust your own instincts about that - you seem to have pretty good instincts - once you feel your own ship is stable, you can always look at his perspective with a fresh eye.
And tbh, it’s worth considering the basic scientific principle of ‘considering the source’ of data, isn’t it? People have agendas, all of us do, and those agendas and interests and experiences shape how we see the world to some degree. Right now, your lens and your spouses lens are unlikely to be the same right now, are they?
Do the ‘ton of terrible decisions’ carry a financial or legal impact for you? Sorry, can’t recall the legal guidance you have decided to take about protecting yourself from his old and new decisions. Pretty common though, if it’s any consolation, that BD is followed by a series of smaller BDs like this although that can be unsettling….
My advice fwiw is to filter through the facts and his words/actions to pick out the few that are impactful in your life and let the rest go fly in the wind. It’s a pretty standard LBS life lesson to teach ourselves what belongs to us and on our side of the street, and what does not.
T: 18 M: 12 (at BD) No kids.
H diagnosed with severe depression Oct 15. BD May 16. OW since April 16, maybe earlier. Silent vanisher mostly.
Divorced April 18. XH married ow 6 weeks later.
"Option A is not available so I need to kick the s**t out of Option B" Sheryl Sandberg
Freefalling into the Void
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