[With Gods Help!]

This isn’t about you or the marriage this is all about him and the internal panic and confusion that he is suffering from. He is searching for some indefinable something and until his search is over you will be banging your head against a brick wall. This is one of the reasons why marriage counseling doesn’t really help in these situations.

The choice is, have him at home doing stuff in his search which for you as a spectator will rip you and the marriage to pieces OR have him living elsewhere where he can continue his illusory search for the non-existent ‘greener grass’.

Meanwhile you and the marriage are protected from his crazy antics and his lies about said crazy antics. This helps you to step off his roller coaster ride and get on with your life in a stable way in which ever way you decide.

Move on, wait or wait then move on, whatever the choice is yours. Remember, you won’t get any sense out of him while he is still searching.

You need to look after you because it will help him feel less guilty and will de-escalate the vicious circle that usually builds up of: crazy antics, lies, exposure, hurt, etc, etc, till you can’t take anymore.

Thing is I think to deal with MLC you have to take a counter-intuitive approach because all the usual things that you think you should do just don’t work. I did all the wrong things. Believed her when she said it was me, became ill and debilitated because of the guilt I felt because I drank her Kool-Aid, wouldn’t agree to a separation, tried marriage counseling, got individual counselor for myself but all it did was make things worse.

The name of the game is damage limitation. You have to protect the marriage by insulating yourself from him during his ‘crazy time’. That way you protect yourself and the marriage till he sorts himself out. It’s like ‘outa sight outa mind’, ‘what the eye don’t see the heart don’t grieve over’ and ‘ignorance is bliss’.

I know it seems like giving him a blank check to whatever the hell he wants to but really he is going to do whatever he wants anyway whether he’s living with you or you are separated. The choice is: Have him living at home where as the spectator you will catch him out in his lies and will get ripped to pieces OR having him living elsewhere where you don’t know what he’s up to and therefore he isn’t hurting you. It’s unconditional love, really.

But the thing is, separation gives him the space to see if the grass really is greener and you and the marriage don’t get ripped to bits with his crazy antics. Also, if he stays at home and because of that he ends up hurting you he will feel so guilty and bad that he will eventually start to blame you and resent you for his bad feelings.

Remember, truth and justice doesn’t really exist in his world for now. He has his own versions of the truth and they will suit him regardless of its right or wrong in reality.

I wish I had let my wife move out for a period of separation but I took the view that if we separated then that would be the end of the marriage. Boy I got it wrong. The harder I clung onto her the harder she pulled away. Ironically she had a friend who was going through MLC.

Her friend moved out with the kids but she and the kids saw the husband every weekend. After 2 years of her seeing if the grass was greener and him not being exposed to her antics they have now reconciled and gotten back together. I’m pleased for them but especially their 2 kids.

Remember, this is not about YOU it’s all about his messed up head. He is confused and his mind will change back and forth constantly.

Separation is tough, but it’s a lot easier than living with him while he is in MLC and it gives you both the benefit of YOU having some sort of normal life while he works himself out and you wait or you decide at some point to move on. At least you will have some measure of control over how much his crisis negatively affects you.

No matter what happens though you will cope. Believe me, it’s one of life’s truisms that none of us know just how amazingly strong and resilient we can be when we have to be.

I hope you find something useful in my comments and that you go on to save your marriage and find the Peace that you need.

[subooru]

THANK YOU SO MUCH!  This was really helpful and so validating to me.  My H was at home for nearly two years and it practically killed me. It was awful.  I too felt that if he moved out, we would be over for good.  Not true.  It is so much calmer and peaceful with him away.  I just think that everything you wrote makes SO MUCH SENSE.  It was as if I was reading my own story.

It isn't about me or any other LBS, but it sure FEELS that way.  It is hard to have the head match the heart.  That is my struggle.  But, I read so many stories here, and I find strength again.

Thank you, With God's Help for your wisdom and for sharing this.  It helps more than I can express.

Subooru

[Gutted]

What an amazing post.  So true for me but sadly on the bad end of things.  I wish I saw this post almost 2 years ago because it's too late for me now.  He's divorcing me.  It's over.  Sad.

But I ask, what happens if they go out to see if the grass is greener and they find that it IS (OW/OM)?  (Or they think it is/will be).   THEN what.

[Anjae]

Thanks WGH.

It is good to have a reminder, now and then, that it is not about us.

I found it much easier when I moved back to our home town and husband stayed in the big city hundreds of kms from me. I know what he is up to because he has a public life, but I'm spared monster, direct emotional contact, any sort of real contact in fact.

I've found peace. No idea if I've save the marriage. Think first we need to see where husband second fault divorce process leads and if, in case there is a divorce, what comes of if. Also nto sure what happens if husband fault divorce goes nowhere like the first one. After first one we remained legally married but totally separated. NC, not seen each other, nothing.

I have a husband only in paper, really. And that is very, very, strange. Well, I don't have a husband at all, because, right now, he is not a husband, there is this man I'm still legally married with would be more accurated.

What is your suggestion for someone with a long term vanisher, WGH? Anything to add to your former comments?

Must say in a way a vanisher is better but you also start wondering what are you doing on your own, without a trace of your spouse...

Gutted, divorcen does not have to be the end.

Good question, what if they find the grass is greaner?... Something tells me that the grass is not greaner if they spend 20 or 30 years with OW/OM...

[StillStanding]

What an amazing post.  So true for me but sadly on the bad end of things.  I wish I saw this post almost 2 years ago because it's too late for me now.  He's divorcing me.  It's over.  Sad.

Divorce doesn't have to be the end of the relationship; it just means more work has to be done to fix things.

I don't have any statistics in front of me, but I can speak from my own personal experience that getting remarried is possible; from the time that I proposed to my wife to our wedding, my parents got divorced and remarried. (There was an OW, and of course once he was living with her that grass turned out not to be so green after all...)

But I ask, what happens if they go out to see if the grass is greener and they find that it IS (OW/OM)?  (Or they think it is/will be).   THEN what.

It is certainly possible for someone to marry the person they ran away to be with; but that doesn't mean their relationship will be successful, any more than your divorce has to mean that you are through.

The statistics show that the likelihood of divorce goes up with each successive marriage; and marriages that begin with infidelity rarely work out in the long run.

[In this for ME]

Divorce doesn't have to be the end of the relationship; it just means more work has to be done to fix things.
That's where I'm at right now- divorced and now we're living together almost exactly a year later.  And boy did you hit that on the head with more work having to be done to fix things. 

As much as I try to have some empathy for him; this is a LOT to try to work past. And some days ( like today) I really think I can't.

I think most of the damage has been done to me and now the work has to be done by me and it makes me madder than he**!!! 

 I HATE playing a victim but I didn't want any of this to happen and had no choice. Now it just feels sometimes like a humungous "Do Over" and I simply can't wipe the slate clean.

[Silmarion]

Thank you WGH.

Sil x

[Anjae]

Divorce doesn't have to be the end of the relationship; it just means more work has to be done to fix things.
That's where I'm at right now- divorced and now we're living together almost exactly a year later.  And boy did you hit that on the head with more work having to be done to fix things. 

As much as I try to have some empathy for him; this is a LOT to try to work past. And some days ( like today) I really think I can't.

I think most of the damage has been done to me and now the work has to be done by me and it makes me madder than he**!!! 

 I HATE playing a victim but I didn't want any of this to happen and had no choice. Now it just feels sometimes like a humungous "Do Over" and I simply can't wipe the slate clean.

May I ask why are you living again with your husband if the two of you are divorced?...Given that you are already divorced and you're finding it so hard, would it not be better if each of you would live separated and meet now and then?...Just wondering if space would not be better for you right now...

[xyzcf]

This isn’t about you or the marriage this is all about him and the internal panic and confusion that he is suffering from

I need to keep reminding myself over and over again.

I agree that it is easier for me that he doesn't live here and as I have experienced, I am better not having much contact..that's for me because any contcat reminds me of the rejection. That part is about me...the intense emotions that accompany the rejection.

Each day, the hardest part continues to be when I wake up, remembering the routines we used to share...today, we'd have coffee, go to church, come home and make bacon and eggs, do some house work, watch some football..I can FEEL it so clearly yet we haven't done that for 27 months.

But once up, I have my own routine for Sundays...and it is a peasant one and gradually, I start to feel ok.

We also must know that we have choices too....in my heart, I realize that he has changed and that the person he is today would not be someone I would have chosen in the past BUT the problem is I still remember him as he was...the hope is that one day, a new him will emerge and of course there is also a new me......and that's almost as scary...so, I really try to get him out of my mind and proceed forward.

Thanks for the post WGH's....we all need reminders.

[stillhopeful]

I totally agree.  If my h hadn't moved out I know our marriage would have disintegrated. I packed all his things and told him to leave. He had already rented an apartmebt but woyldnt leave the house. I caught him in a lie and just lost it. Told him I wanted a divorce and told him to get out. Of course after I srytled down and he settled down we both agreed that we didn't want a divorce. He moved out in July 2011 and lives about five minutes away. Our relationship is pretty good considering. If i had to deal with him at home that wouldn't be the case. I don't want to know what he does. If i did I think it would be harder to reconcile if that day comes. I had thought about hiring a PI but decided against it. That knowledge won't do anything but hurt me and i dont need that. I have two small children that need me to be mommy everyday. With him gone I can do that.