[LisaLives]

So, I have a question for the Reconciled...  I can see exH's crisis working out just as I thought.  This may get long, so I apologize in advance and feel free not to read! 

Seven to ten years, right, for the average MLC, plus over 50% of second Ms in midlife fall apart after 5 years...  So here I am at 5 years post BD and ex is starting to wake up.  He has shown NO SIGNS of wanting to R, but he has done other weird things, like name his boat after me, continue to pay spousal after I told him he didn't have to (and this was a man who tried to take me back to court for pennies of child support), and be much kinder in all his correspondence. Plus, I am engaged, so if it is true that they have to know you are totally disengaged to kick them in gear, that all happened. 

So, I sit here in a position to break off my engagement and take up a stand.  I won't, but I wonder about women who do.  How do you look at them as MEN again?  I am so far from the "damsel who needs a big strong man, macho muscle worshipper."  I have always liked intellectual nerds who can't change their own oil...  BUT, I am still a woman, and while it never bothered me that I was more of the man in our R than he was, I think I thought that when push came to shove and I NEEDED a man, he would be strong and be up to the challenge.  But, he wasn't, when life got tough, he bailed.  And in most cases around here, so did all yours.  And then he M'ed OW and is starting to see that life getting tougher than he thought, so he is starting to think about bailing again.  I do truly believe that if I wanted to pave the way, now would be the time to do it, but I think I would feel like I am paving the way for a pansy-a$$ (won't finish but dudes on the board know what I want to say...) that I could continue to take care of the rest of my life...  How did you NOT feel like that?  Do you truly feel like this man is your rock that you can lean on and who will be there when life gets tough again? 

If I had any inkling to take up that stand, I would have to give up an amazing man.  Granted, it is not a bowl of cherries.  My kids are still DEEPLY unhappy, and do not approve of either of our new partners.  And I struggle every day with how to reconcile that.  But, on the other hand, I found an LBS who loves me for ME, for who I am, and especially for all the trials I have endured BECAUSE that AH put me through hell.  I made awesome friends, I got great jobs, and lived so many things thanks so his MLC.  When you R'ed, did you give up your new life and new friends, or did he accept them, knowing that these were the people who saw you through the darkness, that KNOW the pit of hell HE made you walk through.  And could THEY accept him, KNOWING what they saw?

So, I just wonder how you do it, what it's like.  How do you not look at him like a man-child that is fragile and NOT manly.  You can think I'm shallow, but I wonder if I could ever have great sex with a man that didn't make me feel a little submissive (not 50 Shades here, but you know, a MAN).  And I still come back to my therapist who told me right after BD that if patterns hold, he will be back in six months, or he will wake up after his third M when he has run all he can and realizes it is not the women he picks, but himself.  And she warned me then, that I didn't want to be number 3, so be careful.  And I won't, but I can see how I might, especially if I hadn't already found someone awesome...  But that's all beside the point.  What I want to know is how and how long does it take for you to really look at them as MEN, or am I the only one with gender role issues?   

[stayed]

Hi LisaLives:

I'm willing to answer your question.  I will give you some insight into my life.  The past and the present and I shall leave the future to pan out, as it will!

Although like all marriages, we had our "ups and downs", for the most part we had a great marriage.  His profession took him away from home a lot but when he was home, we always found many fun things to do.  We always loved walking, tobogganing, skiing, hiking, biking.  Even with the appearance of 5 children in 7 years, we still got out and about.  A lot. 

We found affordable ways to entertain ourselves.  Picnicking at many of the lakes near us.  Walking.  Hiking.  Volksmarchs.  Drinking wine.  Enjoying coffee and hot chocolate at the cafe's.  Eating pizza.  The kids and my h were wizards at renaming things.  There was a Speck Cooking, which looked like a pizza only no cheese and no tomato sauce.  It was delicious though... the kids and hubby called it MEDIEVAL PIZZA... they figured mozzarella cheese and tomato sauce had not been invented when this was first discovered... hence it's name.

WE would bike all day Saturday and Sunday's (when he was home) even when he wasn't I would often take the kids to the Stadt Park near by with a picnic and we would play on the swings and look at the animals and birds in the cages.  Many times we went off in our "old second hand car" we called it the "beater", and would attend beerfests/winefest/octoberfests, you name it.  We had a camper and toured all German, France, Italy, Spain, Austria, Switzerland, Britain, Scotland, Belgium, Holland... we were always on the go.  In fact, we went so much, we were the 'GO TO PEOPLE' whenever anybody was thinking of going somewhere.

I sort of thought I might have been embellishing all these activities but this Christmas, 4 of our 5 children started telling their wives and husbands and kids about all the things we used to do.  For some reason, these activities came up a lot this Christmas. 

You know, it was wonderful walking down memory lane like that.  The amazing part, it was all instigated by our children.  Our kids are now 36, 35, 34, 32 and 29, I think it was one of the most pleasant Christmases we have had in many years.  So many wonderful memories.

If our marriage had not survived, sure, we would STILL have had those memories, but that isn't the point.  The point I am trying to make, it was THOSE MEMORIES that convinced me, THAT SAVING OUR MARRIAGE WAS A GOOD IDEA.  We had so many good times LisaLives.  WE had such a joyful history.  Sure, we had some royal battles.  We had some unpleasant incidents with our kids.  A few drunken episodes.  We worried about the "drugs" for a while.  We were a family, we weren't perfect, but we had ALL WEATHERED ALL THOSE THINGS TOGETHER.  We had some near fatal experiences as well, with 5 children, $hit happens.  A terrible head injury, that by some MIRACLE, our sun not only survived but came through with no SIDE effects, no damage whatsoever, not even a loss in hearing, which they were positive he would lose. 

WE WERE BLESSED LisaLives.  The truth is, we had FAR, FAR more wonderful memories, far, far more REASONS to mend our FAMILY then we did to let it go. 

My husband had a pretty damn good track record.  Hi crisis lasted about a total of 10 years.  The first 7 years in the early stages of his crisis, he was not easy to live with, BUT, he was not like that all the time.  Without a doubt, the unpredictable behaviour was rare in the early years and became progressively more constant until we arrived here in Europe.  We had 2.5 amazing years.  Much like the first 22 years of our marriage.  I honestly had concluded that he just needed a change, that he was burned out from almost 30 years in the military.

Then wham... our whole world exploded.  For 2 full years after that, my life was a nightmare.  Then he returned and slowly returned to the man I knew and loved.  My h could change his own oil, my car as well, put on our snow tires and did so, changed the brakes himself... he kept our wedding toaster working for over 20 years... the same for our washer and dryer.  Part of the reason we have what we have now, is because he was so good at keeping our appliances going.

WE committed to strict savings regime.  Yet, we helped our children through school, dressed them well, sent them on school trips and spent many wonderful years together on vacations around the world.  We now enjoy hours at our cottage surrounded by our children and our grandchildren.  Our children join us over here in Europe and we take them to wonderful resorts.  Wine and dine them.  Play with our grandchildren.  Allow our children to go off on vacation while we KEEP their children. 

I am sure I would have been surrounded by my children and grandchildren.  I expect I would have cared for them while their parents were away, but instead, my h and I do it now, as a COUPLE... as GRANDMA Stayed and Poppa Stayed.  We love it.  Our life is just about perfect.  We would have MISSED ALL of this, if we had not reconciled.I SEE my h as even MORE OF A MAN, then he ever was.  He had the courage to face what he did.  He had the strength to stick it out (I did not make his return easy, that I can assure you).  He was not too proud to "grovel", he begged for his OWN FORGIVENESS, not just mine.  He dug down deep and found it within himself to see the horrible things he did and to make amends.  He accepted my new friends as his friends and even helped them to understand, that THIS WAS NOT ABOUT THEM!  My h was always MANLY, extremely brilliant as well, successful, loving, great father and an AMAZING grandfather.  While somehow continued to care about a father who didn't give a damn about him or any of his brother.  And to this day, my h remains a loyal, loving brother. 

All man there.  All man. 

So tell me LisaLives.... what GUARANTEE do you have that this WONDERFUL new partner, will always, love, cherish, respect and LOVE YOU JUST FOR WHO YOU ARE, then I do that my h WON'T love me like that for the rest of his/our days.

There are no guarantee's LisaLives.  We live, we die.  In between, we do the best we can.  I think my husband and I have done much better then most.  We have relished our life together.  We had some tough years but those years, have ONLY helped us to APPRECIATE what we have now, EVEN MORE THEN EVER. 

Not saying you won't have a good life with your new partner LisaLives... but one thing we know for certain, your children will NEVER have the history with your new partner, than our  children and ourselves, will have/would have had, with their biological parent and our spouse/x-spouse. 

I'll take my chances with what I have now.  I had him for 28 years before he went midlife crazy, if it takes him that long to have it happen again, I'll count myself lucky.

Hugs Stayed

[bipolared]

Beautiful, Stayed.  Exactly why I would take my H back.

[LisaLives]

Thanks Stayed, There are never any guarantees--still no guarantee I won't wake up tomorrow and go bats#$% crazy, if I'm not already... 

And like I said, it's not as if I am looking at a real opportunity or anything, but the tiny stander in me ALWAYS wonders...  You're a strong and lucky woman.  And, I would argue, your H is a strong man, also.  I still come back here looking for answers, for patterns and formulas.  Who wins, who loses, when do you know, how do you know?  It still bothers me that I don't get to know the ending...  I always thought I knew what I was living for, what my ending would be--boring, steady and expected.  Now, every day I am faced with choices and decisions I never thought I would make and every single one leads me further from the end I expected...  And now, five years out, it's like I am so different that I can't even look behind me and see the person I was and the life I had.  And I wonder how you even do that--start over...  Anyway, it's all just strange right now, another stage, another perspective...  Just when you think you're done, it all changes again, just to keep you on your toes, I guess.  Karma for the arrogance of thinking I had a boring, steady existence, I guess ;-)...  Love and light, ll

[riverbirch]

Great post stayed.

[stayed]

ahhhhhhhhhhhh LisaLives, I love you girl.  I love your insight and your input.  You keep this forum HONEST. Your one of our best "assets"!

No guarantee's sweetie.  Sometimes, you just got to close your eyes, plug your nose and step off the cliff!   

Hugs Stayed

[gimlan]

I love both Lisa's question and Stayed's response. First of all, it is fascinating that your xH seems to be coming to his senses a bit, perhaps even waking up from the proverbial fog. I think sometimes part of me just want my H to 'wake up', and that I'm not sure whether I really would want him back if he did. Those days I question myself and wonder whether I am just standing to prove him wrong. Now, I don't think I am; I'm standing to heal and to not make any premature decisions, really. I feel that so far, I have used the time wisely, and I would not have wanted to be without it. I have been thinking the same as Lisa about what I would do if he would come back in terms of my new friends. I would NOT be willing to give them up, EVEN if they wouldn't like him and he wouldn't like them. He would have to just live with it. I could never go back, only create something new with him.

Hugs,

Gx

[Songanddance]

Stayed - your answer on its own should become a sticky.

It gives courage to those of us who 18 months- 3 years in wonder why we still stand and it also provides a good reality check as to who the real H is.  It helps us all question whether the marriage we had was what we had hoped for in the first place. The good memories should always outweigh the bad ones and even then the bad ones can be measured by how you responded and dealt with them.

What keeps me standing is just that. There were 2 occasions when H thought he would lose me -sudden illness and then his boat being caught in a storm mid Atlantic. On those 2 occasions he made me very aware that he was terrified of losing me and that he loved me so much.  Those two points stick in my mind and somehow keep me going even when there are days when I wake up and think " umm I'm done!" 

[stayed]

ohhhhhhhhhhhh S&G, the number of times I thought... "I'm done... I just C A N ' T do this anymore!"  AND that was when I thought we were reconciling!  hehehe.  Honestly, I didn't know there was a "before" stage.  I thought once we were back in the same house, we were reconciling. 

The thing is, I didn't want to rewrite our past.  I didn't want to embellish it either. That was what made this Christmas such an "eye opener".  Having the children, laughing and regaling their spouses and kiddies with all the "fun" things we used to do, AS A FAMILY, while in Spain, France, all over Europe and Britain, plus the United States and Canada.  Listening to them, I realized we had really packed in a lot of wonderful memories for all of us.

My h could be a very self centered man, truly he could be.  Much of that though, was my fault, as I was old fashioned and believed that his job was to support us, make the MONEY so we could enjoy our life.  In my mind, the only way he could do that well, was to be able to FOCUS on his PROFESSION.  We both can see that we let it get out of hand.  Fortunately, we are able to discuss this with our children. 

My h is just as willing to talk about these things as I am.  More so in fact, as we are now seeing "cracks" in our older children's marriages.  They are seeing them as well and are now realizing that our DECISION to stay together and work through our PROBLEMS, was really very brave and very wise.  They can see first hand, that it is worth the effort when they see how much their dad and I enjoy being together. 

We are able to talk so honestly with them and they are seeing, there is value and truth in our words.  They have children, they want their family whole.  They can see through us, they have a CHOICE! 

Hugs Stayed

[stayed]

I feel I have an obligation to also say, that NOT ALL MARRIAGES are salvageable!  Some of them, really never were.  If you had a marriage like that, then it is better to LET IT GO... and find true joy and happiness. 

I am only discussing why I felt my/our marriage was worth fighting for.  I'm not making up a new history.  We always enjoyed our time with each other and our children.  We definitely had some darn good "disputes" as well.  There were lot's of times when we disagreed about the best approach or whether we really had to put away THAT MUCH MONEY, each month. 

Only YOU know what is best for you.  Hanging on out of shear stubbornness, fear or living up to "other people's/things" expectations, is not a good enough reason.  Remaining lonely and sad for the rest of your life is not an option either... at least not in my mind, it isn't. 

I'm not sure how many of us truly realize the miracle our lives are.  The thousands of eggs over a woman's lifetime and the billions of sperms from our partners, and somehow, we were the product of the most RANDOM miracle, EVER!  Our lives deserve to be celebrated.  Enjoyed.  Treasured.  We are not intended to live alone and lonely.  We were created to SHARE ourselves. 

Don't waste your lives praying and waiting for something to happen.  Get out there and live your life.  If your MLCer finds his/her way back to you, then WONDERFUL.  If your MLCer is willing to work and truly prove to you, their sincere regret for wasting ONE MOMENT of their life with you, then why wouldn't you grab that?  If they are not.... why would you WASTE a single moment more, trying to make them want you!

We have to let ourselves live.  If life offers us something better, be it the return or our loved one, or the arrival of a new one, then we should grab it, enjoy it and share ourselves. 

Please my friends.  Choose to live!  Choose to live well!  Choose to live this privileged life you have been granted, as fully as you possibly can.  NO REGRETS, my friends.  All of you have tried everything, if you move on, your God wanted you to.  Make no mistake.  There is NOBODY on this forum that has not and is not giving their Spouse, every possible opportunity to resume their lives with us.  If they can't see that, then it is certainly not your fault.

Hugs Stayed