SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

This has been a long wknd. WH told me he is frustrated, with me, the marriage, kids, life. He doesn't know if we can be happy again. He said he doesn't know what else to do. He doesn't see much hope.

This is the 2nd anniv of his dad getting sick. His dad died two months later. (I got a letter telling me he was cheating a month after his dad's death).

I think he probably is over this marriage. I don't know what to think. I am very disconnected from the M right now, concentrating mainly on school and kids. I wonder if I should be doing more for him. I just get so angry. I keep figuring out some things about his A even now. (As far as I know, its over and he hasn't talked to OW for about 9 mths.) I haven't talked to him about these things. I don't bring it up much at all.

When he was telling me how frustrated he was, I told him how hurt I was and how hard it was for me to even get through most days, dealing with the A in my own mind.

He acts like he has given up. He doesn't act like he cares about me. He isn't kind to me, says mean things. I feel no respect from him. I haven't felt like he loves or even likes me for some time.

He is the love of my life, and I don't think I have ever been his.

I wish I could turn back time and do so many things over.

I am afraid that day will come too soon when he tells me he wants to go through with the D, and I know he won't be like me. Once he has made up his mind, he won't change it.

Sorry for rambling, I have no one else to talk to.

(((cg07)))

There is that age old saying "If you love him , let him go. If he comes back he is yours...if he doesn't he never was"

Have this in your mind and just start preparing for S...get your self stronger mentally.

Maybe when he sees you stronger he will finally realize what he has and may lose if he doesn't shape up.

If this doesn't work at least you have been making yourself stronger and that does help to see things clearer.

Oh, crazy girl, my heart really cries for you. You must be living a nightmare!

The first thing I thought when I read your post was, "He has lost respect for her."

On some level - on the outside, maybe deeper down - he can feel the eggshells you are walking on. You feel them, too, as you are careful about what you say to him, how you act around him, etc.

And I believe the main motivator for any of your behavior where he is concerned is based in fear, yes? Fear that he will leave you, fear that he won't look back.

Look, you already know that he actually does change his mind once he makes it up, because of his ping-pong efforts at reconciliation with you. So, I think you can be assured that it is always a possibility.

But never mind that... The 180, to me, anyway, involves not only concentrating on you. You are probably doing that very well. It does not only involve detaching from your WH...that you are doing, too.

To me, the 180 also has a moment of sitting down with him, taking his hands in your own, looking him straight in the eyes, and calmly say to him something like this:

I love you very much. I love our marriage and our history and our life. But I want it to be better, And i know you want that too.

The marriage we both want has been stalled by your affair, and by the way you have treated me since.

I will no longer try to reconcile with a man who is unsure about his feelings and who has not yet helped me heal. I deserve better than that.

...or words to that effect.

I know you don't want him to leave, but in my opinion, that respect for you is vital in order for any kind of a true marriage to take hold.

He doesn't see you as the love of his life. He sees you as the woman who will rug sweep and let him back in without having to do any of the work.

He needs to see the REAL crazygirl. He needs to see the one who insists on a list of things to do in order to reconcile. He needs to see a crazy girl who will stand up for herself and say No More.

If you haven't already, get a copy of Love Must Be Tough by James Dobson. Then follow it.

In the end, you may or may not have your husband. But with certainty, you will have more respect for yourself and for the life you deserve. "Nobody puts Baby in the corner!"

I am praying for you. Keep posting. We will coach you through.

ETA Borrow Trouble posted an excerpt from Dobson's book here, on the second page of the thread:

http://www.survivinginfidelity.com/forums.asp?tid=371700

A timely post, as it contains the words you could say to your husband. It also encompasses the 180...

[This message edited by healingwife at 5:43 AM, September 7th (Tuesday)]

Oh crazygirl, no advice here but please protect, respect yourself. Listen to healingwife's very good advice. My heart goes out to you. Take VERY good care of yourself.

((((crazygirl))))

Thanks for the advice everyone. I am going to go get the book today. I have always felt like I have had to 'prove' my love to him and find ways to 'make' him love me. He is my one and only love and this whole situation is the only 'normal' I have known.

I know I have to learn this situation is not normal. I have alot of things within myself I need to change, and change is hard. Some people around me probably won't like the changes I make.....

((((CG07)))))

not sure i am the best person to give advice but here you go.. around 9 - 10 months ago i was in a similar situation as you were.. its such a tortue i have to say! ((CG07))

then at some point i thought - its no way i can live MY life like this forever.. and simply stopped . stopped walking on eggshells.. and had that conv healing wife suggested..

you know I'd be lying it helped much.. it did, but very little.. i said - listen if things are so bad with me.. why are you here? why dont you just leave? if being with me is so painful - you knw you are a free man - you know where the doors are.. and then he switched.. and said he did not want to leave.. wanted to work on our marriage etc etc.

since then we have been having these kind of conv regularly.. about every few months.. because guess what he keeps on slipping into the same shit...

either way this really sucks.. i am very detached already.. and its v unlikely things will work out between us.

either way - it does get better and do not be afraid to stand up for yourself.. YOU need to take care of YOU, as he will not..

(((CG07)))

Thinking about you qgsin this morning, crazy girl.

You are right; many people will not like the sudden change...er...SPINE. They are so used to the usual dynamic, the change in your attitude will be palpable and maybe even a bit shocking.

All the better.

But try not to think about how your own growth and outlook on the world around you affects anyone but you (and obviously, your children). Right now, in my opinion, the first question you could probably explore in IC is why you thought it was acceptable to remain in a marriage like this...why you thought that you didn't deserve to be treated better. I apologize if that sounds harsh. I truly don't mean it to be. It's just that you know that your situation isn't normal...and you have an idea about what normal should be (whatever that is, but not your reality!).

While my marriage wasn't horrible by any means before the affair, looking back, I was sticking my head in the sand for many years concerning my Husband's drinking and the selfish ways he would treat me. I was no queen, but I was loving and devoted to him...and he knew it.

One of the first questions my IC asked me was if it is so much better now...if he is so much better now...then how could you give yourself permission to take it?

I was a hard question, and at the time, all I wanted to do was focus on my husband. But once my IC drilled the notion of taking care of me first in to my head, I turned a corner in my own healing.

You are in a situation where you are not respected or loved, and it is time to shore up your backbone and take a stand for you.

Keep posting, CG. I am most definitely keeping you in my thoughts today.

Thank you healing wife. We got into it this am. One of my many faults is that I procrastinate. He was upset that I haven't addressed the concerns he has about being frustrated. It is true, I put off his complaints when I don't know what to do or say about them. Another part of me has given up, I have felt like for years nothing I tried was ever good enough for him. I felt like I was trying to do back flips for him and it never made a difference.

Anyway, we talked/argued. No progress made. He says I never discussed going back to work (2 hrs a day just so I could get out of the house and around others) and that wasn't fair to him. That with work and school now, I am neglecting 'duties' around the house, etc. He even stopped calling it a job and called it my 'volunteer work'.

He made several points, some valid, about my short-comings as a wife and mother. The mistakes he thinks I have made in raising our daughter, 'that if it was up to him, he would have handled her different'. (She is a straight A student, never has gotten into trouble at school, never has caused any major trouble period, but does have major self-image problems and self-esteem issues I am trying to help her with).

He had a whole laundry list of complaints. All of which where there before the A, so the A should not be used against him in any of the arguments/complaints he has with me.

I am lost. I am on a damn roller coaster of emotions. Now I am starting the day feeling like a complete failure, esp. at motherhood.

not sure if this is going to help you - but surely it helped me.. My H was like that too - criticising me all the time.. sma stuff - not a great mother, teaching our baby to cry at night hmmm .. etc etc?????

However, our MC said that really he is projecting things onto me.. he is really frustrated and angry wth himself but transfers this onto me.. It sounds like this is happening with you! its so puzzling when it happens!

((((CG07)))) please dont listen to all of this crap .. its his frustration with himself talking.. by the way is he in IC? are you in MC?

I think you really need some help with this..

what i did was to try to address his concerns.. but guess what ?? the goalpost kept on moving.. so go to IC figure out which of your potential issues YOU want to address and proceed..

I suspect one of them will be him not meeting your needs.. you are so busy with doing all of the work + trying to meet his needs that you most likely are forgetting yours and that is NOT good...

YOU need to take care of yourself. as for him - you can always ask him to lead by example ... that you learn by imitation

PS - are you sure he has not re-started the affair or doing something else which might make him feel guilty?

MelissaZZZ-

He basically won't go to counciling. We went a few times and he got frustrated. I didn't care for him either. I can't afford to go now anyways (he won't pay for it).

I think he is ashamed of himself and just wants everything to go away so he doesn't have to deal with what he did.

I am starting to put pieces of the A puzzle together and I think he started at least an inappropriate friendship w/OW while his dad was dying. If that was me I think I would want to kill my self because of guilt. But I don't know.

Everytime I try to focus on myself and my kids, his anger and frustration and jeoulousy flare back up.

I wonder if he is just trying to push me away rather than man up and tell me he wants out....

really sounds like he has difficulty accepting responsibility.. is he normally a person hwo likes to blame others?

our MC said that H misplaced anger and projected his feelings onto me - that was the reason he was so angry , frustrated and jeleaus with me..

its hard without outside help.. other things which helped me/ us were: when he was at the better mood (rarely) i would ask about the anger and the trigers.. basically what trigerred his anger.. usually it was wrong perceptions.. maybe if you ask those questions at some point he would think a little?

also, i bought a book - passionate marriage.. i bought it for 'myself'. but H sneakily read it and that made him re-evaluate his thoughts and impressions..

you can always try to spoonfeed him a little bit of info whenever he is in a better mood..

but this is a very tough and very long road..

and, if he would have wanted to leave - he would have left.. and if he ever decides to - nothing you do will stop him.. so, claim your life back and stop walking on eggshells... just dont engage in his anger rages - tell him to talk to you when he has calmed down.. (((((CG07)))) - love yourself enough not to allow it!

In everything you say it's almost like I hear his voice instead of your own - "one of my many faults" "he made valid points" etc. It sounds like he's putting you down constantly and you've started to believe him.

Here's a site I found really helpful when trying to identify my own abusive patterns - you might get something out of it too:

http://www.drirene.com/catbox/index.php?act=idx

I'm sorry you have to go through all this - remember HE cheated, HE went outside of the marriage. This time should be for your healing, and him trying to prove to you he can do better, not going over lists of your shortcomings (which to me sound mainly like blameshifting).

Let me just back this up a second here. Your H had an affair but now he's frustrated with you, the marriage, the kids? He doesn't know if you can be happy again? He doesn't see much hope?

Well, what exactly is he doing to bring hope and happiness to this party? He had an A, actually 2, right? Now he needs to man up and help you deal with it and heal from it, heal from the devastation that *he* caused you. Then and only then can you two work on your marriage and his frustrations.

Please don't let him beat you up about things that he has a problem with, about how you basically suck and he would have handled everything so much better than you have. He cheated on you. That doesn't make him a stellar person. And the fact that he has no humility about it and still thinks that he gets to stand up on some rock and look down on you like you're the bad person here is ridiculous. I'm sorry, I know this is the R forum so I'm trying not to bash him but my blood is boiling a little over this.

I will say that my H tried, for a few weeks, some of the same stuff. He didn't put me down to the extent it sounds like your H is doing to you, but he focused pretty much on all of the things that *I* supposedly did to him, pre-A, that made him unhappy. At first I bought into the discussions but then I quickly realized that all we were doing was talking about him and what he wanted. It was just selfish behavior as always on his part. So I started stopping him right out of the gate and not getting engaged in discussing *my* flaws. Before we could fix the M, I told him, we had to deal with the A. He didn't like that one bit, of course. He wanted to forget all about what he'd done because he couldn't stand thinking about it and also because at that point he was still blaming me for him going out and doing this.

Things turned around for us when he started to realize that a lot of the way he saw the world pre-A was not correct. And he saw that he had to take responsibility for his part in everything that happened between us, and that he had to take 100% responsibility for his A. I'm not going to say that he's perfect about this still but it's definitely a lot better than it ever was.

Take care of yourself, crazygirl. You are not crazy and you are not to blame for any of this.