I apologize for getting the dates mixed up, there are a lot of them on your tag line.
Listen, I never said there was anything wrong with wanting your WS to make you feel wanted or loved or whatever. In fact, I said I felt that way as well. What I said was, if it's not in their character to do the things your asking (like flowers, notes, cards, poems, etc.) then it's probably not going to be in their character even after DDay to try to win us back.
I set those expectations on my H. While he was able to do a few of those romantic things, he was only able to do some of them, and only for a short period of time. I had to come to terms with the fact that what I was asking him to do what not part of who he was. If a person isn't romantic, it's incredibly difficult for them to TRY to be. If a person isn't complimentary, it's incredibly difficult for them to TRY to be. So if he's never been the kind to shower you with compliments and flowers before, it's not very likely that he'll suddenly turn into that person now because he's in the major dog house.
And I never intimated that you were trying to look for validation from anyone other than your WH. What I did say was that we need to find that validation within ourselves. Looking for it from ANYONE other than ourselves won't help fill that void that we have at all. How many times has a WS told their BS after DDay "you are so sexy", and the BS just rolls their eyes and says to themselves "then why'd you cheat?" It happens all the time! We know we can't believe what comes out of their mouth anyway, and if we don't feel sexy, we're certainly not going to believe it when they say it. We have to feel that within ourselves, we have to feel good about ourselves, it doesn't matter if WS builds us up or not, because there is nothing that the WS can say that will make us feel good about ourselves ever again.
Yes, he can tell you why he loves you. Yes, he can tell you why he wants to stay. Yes, he can read and find out what he can do to help you through this (although, you won't need everything that the books talk about, so this approach won't be very personalized and might not be what you need at all.... communication with him directly would probably serve you better). But the thing that helped me with my self esteem after years of therapy was letting go of expecting my H to heal ME. I had to heal myself, I had to work on my own self esteem, I had to feel beautiful again independent of my H. I don't seek validation from anyone else, OR from my H, I just seek it from myself. Once you get to that point, then the WH's doesn't really matter anymore. When one DOES get a compliment, then it's just the icing on the cake, not the entire meal.
He can't fix you, he can certainly help fix the marriage, but the BS needs to work on themselves. The WS needs to work on themselves. And both need to work on the M. It sucks, but it's how it is.
DDay - Dec '07
Me - BS
Him - WS
Us - working on R - again
May 18, 2010 - I forgave him fully!
D-day 2 July 4, 2015, turns out he is a SAWH, status, working harder than before
May 22, 2019 -slip/relapse. He forgot he has to work forever