[limitless]

To all,

Thanks for the comments on this thread.  I think what happens (to most of us), once the shock of the beginning is over and we begin to stop analyzing every move (or twitch) the MLCer will make....we stop posting....as there is "nothing new" going on in our sitch.

I guess it's because there is just too much time devoted to the MLCer (I am a guilty party.....so I am familiar with this).

Whoever wrote that they missed the beginning (oh...my....the beginning was just so rough.  I felt guilt.  I felt pain.  I was lost.  I was a mess... I DO NOT miss the beginning at all) - I hope that I don't reach a stage where I miss the begining because "something was happening" at the beginning - as opposed to the middle where nothing much really happens.  But, who knows...I may be there someday....

Dragonfly - good to see you post!  I remember meeting you back in April of 2011.  You were already almost at 2 years post BD.  You had moved forward in your life.  You were strong.  You were confident.  I'm glad to see you post, as so many on this site do not know your story....nor what you've been through...and what you have been able to do.  You have so much to share.  So much strength to share.

As far as the MLCer being "happy" with their new life...I see MLC man at work.  He is anything BUT happy.  He's made such a mess and really doesn't know what to do.  His ex-wife has moved on.  His latest relationship finally ended...and he is frantically trying to find a replacement.  Unfortunately, he will not find what he is looking for.  Happiness comes from within.  Anyone who continues to look for happiness outside of themself...will be destined never to find it.

Don't be fooled.  These people (regardless of their "mask") - are not happy.  They are not enjoying the new life they've chosen.   But, this is what they chose.  They need to ride it through.

As far as what the middle feels like?  It feels like my marriage is over...and was over long before I ever knew.  It feels like my H is gone.  Gone forever.  It feels like I need to find myself a new life.  And you know what?  I'm thinking that this is how the middle would feel.  This is how it would feel. 

MLC takes time.  More time than you can even imagine.  More than I even imagined.  It shouldn't surprise us (or disappoint us) that our spouses are still deep in the tunnel after 2-3 years.  Yet, we are disappointed.  I am disappointed.  Expectations....they can kick you in the (you know what) - if you keep on expecting.

I think it feels like this...because it is meant to feel like this.  Believe it or not, it helps me to detach and let go......when I realize (accept) that nothing is going to change any time soon.

Please keep posting your thoughts.

Many hugs to all,

limitless

[Anjae]

I hope that I don't reach a stage where I miss the begining because "something was happening" at the beginning - as opposed to the middle where nothing much really happens. 

I confess I’m at that point. It is weird, I know, but it is a fact that, in the beginning, something was happening. The middle of the crisis has been lasting for so long that little seems to happen. Apart from my husband’s more and more insane clubbing
They being in the tunnel for years and years is disappoint and frustrating but it can also be quite funny.  And tiring.

No, they are not happy. Happy is the last thing they are no matter how they try to pretend otherwise.

[Trustandlove]

OK, just one of my "middle" frustrations....

The continuing half-truths, for lack of a better word.  I know it all points to him not being at peace, still in it, and so on, but it's so tiring. 

Things such as telling our D that he won't be able to be here on a particular day because he'll be abroad with work (doing something that easily could be done at another time...), and then, oh, just btw, he's going to a concert there that night. 

It's so silly.  Yes, it could be that he really does have to be there for work, and that it was such a coincidence that this band is playing just there that night, but in truth, he probably worked it the other way round.    He wanted to see the band (nothing wrong with that per se), and said he'd do the work stuff that day...  and oh, it just happens to be the day that he's generally here to drive the kids around. 

No outright lies, just the bleep-bleeping around.    It's the casualness of it, the something of it.   One of those things that is hard to pinpoint, which is also maddening.    Because each part of it on it's own isn't something that can be called bad per se, it's just the overall total self-absorption of it. 

I guess he doesn't tell them because they can relate to "I have to work", but "I want to go to see a band" sounds selfish.  So he knows that it isn't exactly right, but still falls down on the side of what suits him....   and finds a way to justify it. Grrr. 

I know this is MLC, and that is normal for MLC, but one thing about this middle is that it's just so tiring.  This kind of stuff reminds us that this IS the middle, that they aren't anywhere near through, and that right now there really doesn't seem any way through. 

It's like "oh, Bleep, is this STILL happening??" 

Not that it affects our daily life much; I sort the kids anyway, but I also hate the example that it sets.

Grrr 

[Stillpraying]

No outright lies, just the bleep-bleeping around.    It's the casualness of it, the something of it.   One of those things that is hard to pinpoint, which is also maddening.    Because each part of it on it's own isn't something that can be called bad per se, it's just the overall total self-absorption of it. 

Not that it affects our daily life much; I sort the kids anyway, but I also hate the example that it sets.

Grrr

Yes, I hate the 'mature' tone and casual way he dismisses me and my requests for the kids.  He tries so hard to act like he has it all in control.  It IS maddening!!!

[Trustandlove]

I think it is also the constant reminder that the kids (and I, of course), aren't anything special, just something to be fitted into his schedule.

And the twisting -- way back when, in the first years after BD, when I might still have 'called' him on something like this, he'd respond by saying that "well, you didn't let me do my own things, that's why I left and am doing them now" -- turning it around to try to make it my fault, that I'm too controlling, and so on....

Of course, in a 'normal' situation it would be perfectly normal for any H to want to go see a band one weekend, generally a normal H would recognise that this involves some inconvenience for the rest of the family and at least tries to compensate in some way.  So it's a double-twist -- he's first of all not behaving normally at all, and then on top of that berates the LBS for not going along with it. 

It's just the frustration.  I guess it's also frustrating that it can still bother me, that I still on some level might think that there is something I should be doing.  There isn't; it's all been done, this is just what it is. 

yuck.