Is there hope?

[Craig2425]

Lol dot. Thanks I needed a laugh this morning

I tried to put my answers below each question and failed. So you have to read the quote because I put some answers in there

 

Testing, testing 1,2,3....

.

 

Told you in PM she was gonna do this. She feels crap about herself and is blaming all the externals. You are trying to present external options when she isn't ready to hear them. Active listening.

 

Please feel free to kick me in the a$$.

I got what you were saying i just chose not to take it in the heat of the moment. I panicked (still am). I'm scared that if I give her space she will be gone and I did nothing but sit back and watch. Thats my problem. It feels like I should be trying for us.

 

If she is going around telling you how "it's done" "it's done" "I need space" "what's on tv?" she hasn't withdrawn and you haven't just taken the info and just been that guy who can listen without resistance.

 

She does say this. Just says I need my space to work on me. I'm done. For once I'm gonna do what I want for me and I don't want you.

How do you give someone lime this space? Just completely ignore them unless spoken too?

Remember kind of like all the 180 principles. Seriously, right now your happiness cannot be dependent on her stability. She ain't there yet.

Again, so just go back to ignoring eachother ?

Hit the books again and stay calm. She never worked through the abandonment issues so here they come again. And they were so much fun last time.....

 

Why wouldn't she want to keep working on us and her at the same time? Why give up our family? She says it's not the fact that I left. It's all the other stuff. The emotional abuse thru out the entire relationship.

It's all that stuff that she can't get past.

 

As long as she feels crap about herself and powerless, she isn't going to want to be in the marriage. People are like that.

 

It seems like she has all the power right now.

She's getting to choose to stay or leave.

 

Just hit the books again, learn to duck, be positive and optimistic and wait this one out. I know it gets harder each time because the connection feels less and less and you reach a max tolerance for feeling alone or shamed by your partner. I am not saying to eat her crap for breakfast until the end of time, but I do believe ending a relationship is a very personal decision.

 

How long do I wait and give her space? When do I say enough is enough and you need to decide? If I give her this space will she realize she wants us? Or is it just a crap shoot?

 

Btw she might even be kind of "addicted" to yanking your chain in the relationship for the reaction, if you don't give her a smother/abandon reaction that will go a long way.

She might be. A lot of the way she says stuff is like she's super pissed at me and is in some way getting back at me.

 

What was different about the way you were acting when you reconciled vs. now?

 

When we first got back together she jumped right back in and it seemed like she was trying. She told our counselor that things were going really good. She sees that I'm working on me and sees a lot of improvments.

I thought things were going really well so I kept pushing for things to go faster.

I'd say just about a month ago she started to pull away. I guess had enough of the little things that we were working past. Meeting my needs and her needs that were never met.

The last two weeks she just got real down ( depressed) and started to ignore me.

Stopped wanting to talk, see or hang out with me.

Last Monday at our counseling session she opened up and said that I pushed too fast.

She just jumped right into this and pushed all her feeling aside hoping they would go away but they don't. I could be perfect and she could just be sitting there and have a thought jump in her head and totally get pissed at me.

She's sick of the fact that now this guilt of leaving will be her fault( her words).

She never choose for any of this to Happen and this isn't fair that it's all on her now.

She wasn't really happy with us since we started to try. It was just her trying to see if things would get better for her.

Our counselor said that I should just give her space but I was struggling with it.

My wife blew up on me and said see. You only care about your feelings. Not mine. I need space and you can't even do that( I was trying to see how we could fix things. Remember she's ignored me for almost two weeks).

Then she said she's done. She can't handle all this plus all the stuff from our past.

She's read and researched and we have too many problems to work past and doesn't thing she can ever love me.

How can she work thru this stuff if she doesn't feel anything for me. There's no drive to.

Then it was the I need my space .you never gave it to me. I'm done for sure. You're not giving me my space.

This morning she thru out the

You don listen. People told you to gibe me space and I'd probably come back.

Our counselor told you to give space and thing would probably get better.

So now she's just done.

Said she's ok with us not being a family and that our daughter will be better in two houses then one where we fight.

We haven't fought since trying and I thiught we were getting better.

I have no idea what's going on in her head.

She got upset that I researched to help out with the emdr stuff.

Thoughts?

[Craig2425]

I tried talking to her telling her that I want her to be happy and I'm gonna give her space.

She said she really needs it and I need to leave her alone but who knows what the future holds.

I said let's not move too fast and have me move out right away just incase and she flipped out.

Saying that is bs! I'm trying to control the situation( I just don't want to hurt our daughter in case).

She then said fine you pay rent and I'll live somewhere else the days you have her and when I have her you leave.

I want to get the divorce started over right now and have a restraining order against you.

 

Why is there such a rush all of a sudden?

Something seems weird.

I don't get how four days ago she was ok with what our counseling said by try giving space but now she needs me out and splitting our time with our kid starting today.

[marqueemoon4]

wait, what? why would she put a restraining order against you?

[Craig2425]

Because I was texting, emailing and calling her.

I just don't get the extreme change of heart.

[dreamingoftigers]

Someone is having a temper tantrum, that's why.

 

You drop any pretense of trying to fix the marriage with her, pronto. El ****ing pronto.

 

This has been the most useful thing to me so far.

 

I actually boxed up every last relationship book I own (except for Divorce Remedy) and gave them to my husband and said "we are so past this point right now. I just want us both to be happy and lead happy lives. Right now I don't want to be in a mad rush to move out or turn our lives upside down and i would like to enjoy some bits with us as a family without having all the pressure of trying to fix this or fix that blah blah."

 

So all of a sudden he doesn't think I am manipulating him to be married to me and he starts to relax. He tests me a little (drinks for a week straight, I say nothing, if we are "going are separate ways" then what do I care right?).

 

He starts cooling off and doesn't feel trapped. Suddenly as I go out a live my own life little things start happening: he hugs me, he kisses me for the first time in like a month. Second time was just as I was typing this.

 

He starts bugging me to spend more time with him. As soon as they don't feel cornered they start to relax.

 

And feelings are a biggie here. I think they feel too responsible for our feelings and their feelings and they feel guilty if they aren't keeping us happy. Kind of like lifting weights, they just get too overloaded VERY QUICKLY. I haven't shared a single feeling with my husband in over a week nor had any of the conversations that stress him out (I.e. How is your drinking and porn addiction doing, Jackass?)

 

I just look at it as since he is being an ass my feelings are no longer his business.

 

Furthermore he isn't rushing to get out or get me out of the house anymore. But my plan is actually to go anyways in a few months once he has settled into enjoying my company again. By then things will be much more relaxed etc and I have played out this cycle so many times that I know he will probably say that he wants us to be together etc. By this point I will be able to say that we should stick with the plan that we had before and that I don't want to continue a marriage with addiction involved. Me nagging and being a birch can no longer be the excuse and he can take it from there.

 

You just slow things down, perk yourself up, show her that you are dropping your "marital repair agenda" and work on enjoying her company and not trapping her in any way. Do not pursue, just LISTEN.

 

I.e.: "I am so done with this marriage"

"well I guess so, you sound pretty frustrated by it."

 

"you should've given me space"

"yea probably, should've done a lot of things differently, I can only look to whatever the future brings I guess. Sorry it caused you so much pain over the years."

 

Everytime she tries to trap you with a guilt trip, pull out a positive.

 

It is so hard to get the hang of this stuff when they are emotionally beating you down. You just have to realize that you are dealing with a very emotionally immature person a lot of times. What you have done surely has caused problems but people who want their families to work realize that they all have problems and that if someone is willing to change for the better that the healing has to be their own responsibility. You can only fix your own future behaviour, she can't be expecting you to go inside her and rewire her neurons. She is going to be pissed off over what happened with or without you. She's not going to outrun it.

[Craig2425]

She seemed pretty pissed off that how dare I ask what's going on.

Example: I told her I'm giving her space because I want her to be happy.

She said you don't get it. I've never had time on my own to work thru these things. Who knows what the future hold. WTF? Who says they don't want you and there positive and then in the next sentence say who knows what the future holds?

 

I say I do see where you're coming from and that's why even tho this is hard on me I'm going to give you your space. I just don't want to up and leave in case something changes or to hurt our daughter.

 

Then she flipped out. That's when she said she was gonna wait to file again but now she wants the divorce, me out of the house and if I text,email or call her she wants a restraining order.

 

Am I crazy? She just said the sentence before that who knows what the future holds.

 

So now I'm stuck in a hard place.

1. I don't want to just leave because that's what I always did before and I'm working on me. Talking and taking my time with stuff that bothers me.

But i have a feeling that she's gonna use this to get mad at me that I'm still here.

2.if I try and ask her what she wants me to do she's gonna say "see, I told you that you can't give me space".

 

To top off this disaster. I've recently lost my job almost out of savings and my birthday is coming up.

I have so many thoughts running thru my head.

She's just getting even with me for all the pain I caused her.

She's cheating or up to no good with the sudden change of heart and rush to get me out.

She does need space to get past stuff and is unwilling testing me to see if I'm going go listen, and or break and go back go my old self.

She just did this half assed trying to save face and she can always say she tried.

 

How could we go from 4 days ago at our session to try and give space to you need to get out and starting today this will be my weekend and next will be yours with our kid?

 

Do these people see that they cause so much confusion with their all their contradictions.

If she's done and she knows this 100%

why throw out who knows what the future holds

Or if you would have given me space I think things would be different.

 

Something must have happened for this drastic change tho.

[Craig2425]

Was on another part of the board and came across this. Wonder how true this is?

 

 

If someone tells you they “love you” but aren’t “in love with you” – it means they don’t want to have sex anymore and/or be vested in a partnership with shared goals, if they feel the “marriage compromise” is not providing them with any achievment of their individual dreams and goals. They may still care about you and your wellbeing, but as a friend and human being, not as a lover and partner.

 

If your spouse tells you they don’t love you anymore, want out of a marriage, are not happy being married to you, or they need time apart, but they say they’ll “consider” reconcilliation, they are doing so only because you’re probably emotionally badgering or bullying them with “commitment, kids, history, blah blah blah” and they want to pacify you until they can free themesleves without all of the drama. It’s amazing that people can say in the same sentence “My spouse says they want out, they’re not in love anymore but they will try to work on the marriage” and the only thing people take away from that and try to hold them too, is the LAST PART.

[jaymz]

Was on another part of the board and came across this. Wonder how true this is?

 

 

If someone tells you they “love you” but aren’t “in love with you” – it means they don’t want to have sex anymore and/or be vested in a partnership with shared goals, if they feel the “marriage compromise” is not providing them with any achievment of their individual dreams and goals. They may still care about you and your wellbeing, but as a friend and human being, not as a lover and partner.

 

If your spouse tells you they don’t love you anymore, want out of a marriage, are not happy being married to you, or they need time apart, but they say they’ll “consider” reconcilliation, they are doing so only because you’re probably emotionally badgering or bullying them with “commitment, kids, history, blah blah blah” and they want to pacify you until they can free themesleves without all of the drama. It’s amazing that people can say in the same sentence “My spouse says they want out, they’re not in love anymore but they will try to work on the marriage” and the only thing people take away from that and try to hold them too, is the LAST PART.

 

This is pretty much spot on in my case

[dreamingoftigers]

CRAIG LISTEN:

 

okay it is kind of hard to articulate but I will try again:

 

Give her no emotional overload whatsoever. NONE ZIP ZILCH NADA

 

That includes everything from: this is hard on me but I will do x. I don't want this to be hard on our daughter. Etc etc etc. Nothing that introduces the potential for any kind of guilt. It's trapping.

 

I know that she "should" hear it and "should" deal with it, but I am straight up telling you that any emotional stress = her feeling trapped and especially by the marriage.

 

She isn't going to hold anyone else's interest at heart right now because she is in survival mode. Basically you just told her: I won't come by the cage and poke at you for a bit, I'll miss doing that but I won't open the door just yet in case you start to like it in there.

 

I have been reading oh about a ton more on trauma and abandonment. Just NO EMOTIONAL SHARING OVERLOAD OR MENTION OF ANYTHING CONNECTING YOU OR HER TO A MARRIAGE OR FAMILY. YOU KEEP HITTING THE SAME BUTTON.

 

Don't get me wrong. I get it. I 110% get it. I am the same ****ing way married to an emotionally retarded spouse. You want to reason with her and be rational. Not going to happen. Have you ever tried to reason with a wounded animal: "now wolverine, please stop biting into my leg, that really hurts, and it's anti-social. You aren't going to make many friends that way."

 

No way man. You know damn well that that is only going to get you both hurt. I swear to god the thing that helped me the most (and this is really bad) was that I started thinking of my husband as emotionally retarded. As soon as he got cranky and temper tantrumy, I just let it go because clearly he didn't understand. (sometimes when he got really pissy I would envision him as a slow guy that worked at a box factory that would get mad if a box didn't fold the right way, it worked. I actually felt better about myself being able to make it through one of his tantrums).

 

You said you were pushing for the reconciliation to go faster and that triggered a lot of this. It probably brought up a lot of "pressure on her to be xyz" feelings, similar to when you would, um, talk about her intelligence. No surprise there. Trauma tends to "cluster."

 

The most important thing I have read about reconciliation is to let them set the pace and have no expectations of them. You are wearing your expectations of her on your sleeve. Drop em now. Nothing is in the context of the relationship anymore or quite frankly, you will lose it.

 

Don't look at how she acts when she is stressed to the max trying to avoid guilty to how your marriage will look and stop pressuring her for answers. That's like asking her how she will feel tomorrow. She doesn't know yet because she's in survival mode. The way she is trying to take the pressure off is by removing the pressure (I.e. You wanting answers and a faster reconciliation). You cannot back away from her fast enough.

 

Honestly Craig, she will rebuild it with you (she just needs to calm the **** down) but she needs to move slower then you want. When you approach her think: is this for my own ego, or is this going serve the marriage long-term. At first her responses will help you sort that out.

 

What you may not realize is that she is sending you into survival mode too. Like you have to keep this marriage or you might go mad and you want your child to be safe and secure. Just remember that being patient is crucial and if you try to get her to help you through that fear or shame, you might be in trouble.

 

Craig, yesterday my H yanked my connection chain again when I dropped him off for work. He made a big deal about our daughter and told her how much he loved her. Then he looked at me and said "see you later."

 

Nice eh? I said "yeah bye" friendly like I didn't even notice there was anything wrong with it. I get an email from him explaining that he recognized the situation when he got into work and that he loves me and hopes I have a great day. He's slow.... But they slowly start to catch up. They test. Or they are dumb.

 

I find that he does make the changes I expect if I am not after him to make them, but he is about 25% slower than I would be.

 

A little bit ago he started drinking again (a divorce busting coach warned me about this one coming so I was prepared). My usual response would be to remind him that I will leave, nag him, let him know that he is an alcoholic and I won't let my kid be raised in that environment, reiterate all the health concerns, share my embarrassment etc etc god I am kind of naggy). He also told me that I would either need to "relax or leave" about his drinking and that he was "sick of hurting me." (such crap).

 

Instead I let one of his homeless friends stay with us for a week, they both got drunk as skunks. I said nothing. He missed 3 days of work, two he didn't call in for. I said nothing. He asked what I felt about it. I said if he wanted to be retardedly self-destructive that that was his business and left it at that. He ended up DTing really bad and stunk like a beer truck. Guess what?

 

All of a sudden he doesn't want to drink anymore because it was a "stupid thing to do and I was right to be concerned." hasn't had anything in a week or so. Cleaned up his beer cans and his friend left. I know damn well if I would have nagged him or teared up he would have continued it for months, even if he had to lie about it.

 

Emotionally for out walkaway spouses it's a small world after all until they realize that they aren't connected to you like they want to be and that you are quickly becoming a distant point on the map.

 

I have some harder tests then you coming up. But I am prepped. I also have some extra help. But you can totally be emotionally independent of her for awhile just to pull your family through this. She might be saying all the last things but she has not left the building yet.

 

Here, make a little list of all the conversation pieces that stress her out:

[dreamingoftigers]

She seemed pretty pissed off that how dare I ask what's going on.

Example: I told her I'm giving her space because I want her to be happy.

She said you don't get it. I've never had time on my own to work thru these things. Who knows what the future hold. WTF? Who says they don't want you and there positive and then in the next sentence say who knows what the future holds?

 

I say I do see where you're coming from and that's why even tho this is hard on me I'm going to give you your space. I just don't want to up and leave in case something changes or to hurt our daughter.

 

Then she flipped out. That's when she said she was gonna wait to file again but now she wants the divorce, me out of the house and if I text,email or call her she wants a restraining order

 

Am I crazy? She just said the sentence before that who knows what the future holds.

 

So now I'm stuck in a hard place.

1. I don't want to just leave because that's what I always did before and I'm working on me. Talking and taking my time with stuff that bothers me.

But i have a feeling that she's gonna use this to get mad at me that I'm still here.

2.if I try and ask her what she wants me to do she's gonna say "see, I told you that you can't give me space".

 

To top off this disaster. I've recently lost my job almost out of savings and my birthday is coming up.

 

I have so many thoughts running thru my head.

She's just getting even with me for all the pain I caused her.

She's cheating or up to no good with the sudden change of heart and rush to get me out.

She does need space to get past stuff and is unwilling testing me to see if I'm going go listen, and or break and go back go my old self.

She just did this half assed trying to save face and she can always say she tried.

 

How could we go from 4 days ago at our session to try and give space to you need to get out and starting today this will be my weekend and next will be yours with our kid?

 

Do these people see that they cause so much confusion with their all their contradictions.

If she's done and she knows this 100%

why throw out who knows what the future holds

Or if you would have given me space I think things would be different.

 

Something must have happened for this drastic change tho.

 

Do ya think she might be impulsive just a tad?

 

Look you can play the worst case scenario game all day long and end up back here.

 

If you already know that asking her about her plans will flip her out then word to the wise: don't do it.

 

Let her approach you and announce her Grand New Life. And if it is reasonable (I.e. Not "hey you, go grab a backpack and sleep outside.") then just say okay. She's expecting a war and a beg-a-thon. Don't give her one, let go of control of the situation.

 

One nice little sneaky thing I did with my husband was I told him that discussing the "inevitable end of this marriage" was depressing for me so I didn't want to actually talk about it until I lost 20 lbs and was set up to move into my own place. And he had to read two books.

 

He thinks he won and that now he can indefinitely put off talking about the marriage because that was his number one stress conversation. What he did was buy me time to improve myself physically and emotionally while he plays marriage rebellion. At the end of a couple of months I am going to look like a pretty good wife to keep around, and then he'll have to read a couple books to keep me around. Seriously, the more our spouses have to work to keep us, the more they want us. The more we work to keep them, the more they want to run. He is that back and forth. Buy. Yourself. Time. To calm your nerves. The more stability you can bring to the situation the better off you will be.

[Craig2425]

I get what you're saying and thats the only option i have.

She did say that she has all this pressure on her to make this work now and it's not fair that all the guilt will be on her.

 

Thanks for the info. It makes a lot of sense and helps. If you have more feel free to throw it my way.

I have a question for you.

We have bought tickets to go see a comedian tomorrow night and I don't see a reason why she should go. She asked me and I said i don't get why.

She said ok and asked what I was gonna do with it.

I haven't done anything with it and haven't really thought about it. My sister and bf and mom are going too and I'm still going to go.

She keeps asking me what I've done with it. If I've asked anyone and I've had too much **** toneven think about that.

Should I just tell her she can go or is that her have her cake and eating it too?

[dreamingoftigers]

I'll put it this way: she requested it, it really isn't going to tear down anything worse at this point.

 

I remember one night my H took me to see a comedian and I was dead cold for most of the night and then things lightened (it was a really crappy comedian, one good joke the whole set!). We ended up having an actual nice kiss that night.

 

Time is still on your side if you just play like she hasn't affected your whole being.

 

Just be like, "yea, sure, come."

 

You aren't going to analyze her motives because you can't read her mind anyways. If it isn't any skin off your nose then go for it. The whole point is that you are not going to be overreactive or underreactive to her.

 

Anything that can make you overreact or underreact can control you and usually does.

[dreamingoftigers]

Point blank: you treat her like any other person in the crowd.

[Craig2425]

I said ok you can go. Her response was i don't want to go if its gonna make it harder on you. I don't want to things to get weird and you expect things.

I just said I told you I am giving you your space and if you want to go that's fine.

I don't expect anything. You know where I stand and I know where you stand and that's that.

 

Was that too much emotional stuff or was that ok?

I wasn't mean or needy. Just seemed like what ever

[worldgonewrong]

dreamingoftigers always offers great advice.

[Craig2425]

Doesn't she?

And she can see the future.

She told me this stuff would happen and now it is.

This is why I'm looking for her guidance.

[worldgonewrong]

CRAIG LISTEN:

 

Emotionally for out walkaway spouses it's a small world after all until they realize that they aren't connected to you like they want to be and that you are quickly becoming a distant point on the map.

 

 

This is very prescient.

 

Whenever I recede, my wife surfaces on my radar as if we are a couple with actual husband-and-wife concerns. It's maddening.

[Craig2425]

Dot. Seriously thank you so much For responding. Exspeacialy that last couple.

I really laughed out loud (both times) when I got to the part about the slow guy at the box factory.

I don't know what you did but what you said in those posts made something click in my head and set me straight. Almost back to where I was when this first went down and I just started to feel good about myself and the situation.

 

I read that and I just thought to myself, she's right.

I'm just making things worse for myself.

I can't control her or make her realize what she's doing. All I can do is know I am not the same guy I was and I'm still working on me because I want to be a better guy for me, my daughter and any other person in my future.

 

Your post helpled out the rest of the night until I came to bed. I started to have mixed thoughts again but I just re-read your post and it did the same thing.

I really appreciate you taking the time to set me straight with all your own stuff you're dealing with.

 

One question I have is you said just stay calm until she comes to me with a real plan for me to leave.

Most of the time I hear people say you shouldn't leave and try to stay but in my case I should just leave?

 

Any other tips from your books on this subject would be great.

[worldgonewrong]

I don't know what you did but what you said in those posts made something click in my head and set me straight. Almost back to where I was when this first went down and I just started to feel good about myself and the situation.

 

Dude, funnily enough, even though her reply was directed at you,

her words at the same effect on me too! She's great that way.

[marqueemoon4]

Canadians are kool

[Craig2425]

I swear this woman is crazy and says stuff just to say it.

The other day she was listing all this stuff she doesn't like about me.

Listen to music loud

My sense of humor blah blah blah

I take our daughter for a bike ride this morning and when I get back who's got the music up loud?

 

She's also been doing something similar to what your husband did dot.

Shes making a point to tell our daughter she loves her when she's leaving and doesn't even say anything to me.

Why would this person want to go with me tonight if she's done with me?

Why would she be so worried if I have tried to give the ticket away?

This stuff bugs Me so bad. So much contradiction with everything.

[Craig2425]

So I ask her what's going on for tonight. Is she going and she just said I don't think so. WTF? She makes a big deal and asks me non stop if I got someone to go and make it seem like she wants to go.

I say to her you can go if you want and she says I've always wanted to go but I don't want things to get weird for us.

Now I have to ask her if she's going and she says that? Why make all this stink if you aren't going?

Her reason is because she doesn't have anyone to watch our daughter anymore.

I swear she just wants to Fu-- with me just to cause me pain for revenge.

Ugh......

[Craig2425]

I didn't make a big deal about it. Just came here to vent.

She has just been outside cleaning for 2 hours so she must not really want to go since she's not looking for a babysitter.

[Craig2425]

I feel like no matter what I do it's the wrong choice.

Do I ask her to try and get a babysitter ?

She might think I'm expecting or hoping something out of it.

Or do I just say screw it? I told her already she could come and I'm not beg her.

I said I would give her space and I don't want to pressure her .

[Craig2425]

She said shes just gonna take our daughter to one of her friends house and not worry about it.

I swear she jut wants to **** with me.

I just said ok and went back to what I was doing.

Why make such a big deal with what I'm doing with this ticket and tell me you always wanted to go then pull this crap?

Sorry for all the posts. Just trying to vent instead of talking to her.